


Legacy

by celinamarniss



Series: Legacy [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends - All Media Types
Genre: Adventure, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Character Death, EU remix, F/M, Families of Choice, Force Bond (Star Wars), Gen, Kid Fic, Mama Bear Mara Jade, a few other cameos and EU easter eggs, consolation baby, episodic, skip to the good bits
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-03
Updated: 2016-10-24
Packaged: 2018-08-19 07:20:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 7
Words: 27,802
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8195735
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/celinamarniss/pseuds/celinamarniss
Summary: Shortly after the events of A New Hope, a young Emperor's Hand has a life-changing meeting with a fledgling Jedi. Mara Jade takes a very different path than in the books.





	1. Prologue

_Unnamed planet_

The sun had set over the small uninhabited planet, casting Mara's camp into inky shadows lit by the flickering of a single fire. The firelight glinted off the hull of her battered ship, its nose buried deep into the earth. The night chill had begun to set in, and small nocturnal animals were beginning to stir. Mara paid little attention to the setting sun or her campsite, her entire focus on the lights of a rapidly approaching ship crossing the sky above.

She’d sensed Vader the moment his ship hit the atmosphere.

 _Of course_ he had caught up with her here, on this forsaken dirtball of a planet, her ship damaged beyond her limited capacity for repairs and with no means of escape. He'd been hunting her for nearly a decade, and she'd narrowly escaped his grasp on several occasions. Over the years, she'd had a hundred plans and strategies to avoid the Dark Lord. It was just dumb luck that he had happened to catch up with her two days after her ship had been infested with kriffing  _mynocks_ and crashed on an uninhabited planet on the far side of the galaxy from anyone who might come to her aid. It was  _luck._ Mara refused to believe the Force had guided Vader to her. 

There was nowhere to run, no time to hide. Vader could sense her, too, and he wouldn’t let her escape this time.

She tightened her grip on the lightsaber in her hand and pulled back the hood on her jacket. A light breeze tugged at her worn clothes as she watched the ship grow brighter as it approached. She wasn't going down without a fight. She didn't fear her own death—it had haunted her for years—but she was terrified of what would happen when Vader found what was hidden in her ship. Yoda would have lectured her about maintaining a Jedi's calm, but Yoda was dead, and Mara was alone. 

Vader's shuttle descended like a grim black bird that gracefully folded its metallic wings as it came to rest on the far side of Mara's camp. The ship opened with a loud hiss of hydraulics and the billowing rush of steam as stormtroopers marched out, falling into formation on either side of the gangplank. Vader strode from the ship. He stopped at the edge of her camp and stood, clasping his hands to his belt in a display of casual arrogance as he surveyed the scene.

"Mara Jade," he addressed her coldly, the rasp of his mechanical breath loud in the quiet of the night. "Traitor to the Empire." 

"Vader."

They regarded each other across the flickering fire.

"It has been almost ten years. How did you manage to elude me for so long?"

Mara smirked. "Wouldn't you like to know."

"No matter. The Emperor will see you that pay for your betrayals."

Mara felt fear wash over her again, the type of fear that left her cold and shaking, unable to even think—No. Stop. _Remember your training._

"Where is the child?"

He _knew._ "What. Child," Mara gritted out. Her defiance wouldn't save her, but it was all she had. 

He tilted his mask slightly as he stared impassively down at her. She could feel him pressing against her mental shields, and although she didn't think he could break through them, she knew that only a quick sweep of her campsite would reveal what he was looking for.

Vader wasn't stupid. "Search her camp."

"No." Mara brought up her lightsaber, the ignited blade casting a magenta glow across her features as she stood between her camp and the stormtroopers. Vader let her take out the first few foot soldiers, cutting them down in swift fluid strokes of her weapon before he stepped in. He caught her in a force grip, holding her in place as the stormtroopers marched around her.

It was the nightmare that she’d had for the last seven years coming true at last. Her body paralyzed by Vader, she screamed curses at the stormtroopers as they searched the camp and entered the wreck of her ship. It didn't take them long to march out again, herding a boy in front of them, his small figure dwarfed by the faceless white soldiers. She could feel his terror and fought harder against the unbreakable grip until she was gasping for breath, her limited abilities no match for Vader's sheer power. 

Several of the troopers were limping.  _Good job, Ben,_ Mara thought grimly.

His red-gold hair and bright blue eyes were a dead giveaway to his parentage. Though no emotion could ever show through that black mask, Mara felt the burst of shock from the Sith Lord. He must have been told she was traveling with a child, but she sensed he hadn't been entirely sure of her son's existence, or who his father was. He knew now.

"The son of Skywalker," Vader hissed. She could feel his rage building behind the black mask, like an oncoming storm. "You kept him hidden from me."

The force grip loosened, and it was enough for Mara to break free and go for the stormtroopers surrounding her son. She felt a blaster bolt sizzle past her shoulder as she thrust through the heart of the nearest trooper and whipped around to decapitate the soldier that rushed up behind her. Ben was shouting and fighting against the trooper holding him. She lunged for them and was yanked back again in Vader’s iron grip. He was toying with her. 

"I'll die before I let you lay a finger on him," she spat. It was sheer bravado; he had all the power here.

"That is not necessary. Shoot to stun."

His stormtroopers let out a volley of stun blasts, and Mara couldn't deflect them all. As she fell into unconsciousness she screamed out, her cry echoing through the Force.


	2. Chapter One

_Myrkr_

The blaster in Mara's shaking hands wavered slightly as she leveled it at the Rebel pilot in front of her.

"What have you done?" she demanded, hating the panic in her voice. "How are you doing _that?"_

The presence she had felt in her mind as long as she could remember was gone. Vanished. She called frantically for her Master but there was no response; it was as though her access to the Force had been switched off like a light. Had he abandoned her? She felt a surge of fear and rage at the very thought. No, it had to be something else. Something to do with her prisoner, no doubt.

This was supposed to have been a simple, routine execution. She had been sent to the planet of Myrkr to remove some uppity smuggling boss that had crossed Palpatine one time too many; a minor mark on a backwater planet. Breaking out of hyperspace, she stumbled on a rebel fighter lurking over the exact same planet. After a furious fight with an opponent whose piloting rivaled her own, they had both crashed their ships on the surface of the planet, deep in the thick forest that covered the continent, and far from any of the planet's small settlements. Now she was on the wrong side of the planet as her target, completely and mysteriously cut off from her Master, and with a prisoner to deal with. He wouldn't give her his name—just the standard prisoner of war nonsense—and frankly, Mara didn't care. Let the interrogators figure that out. 

He was staring at her blankly, his hands in the air. The pilot was slim, and taller than she was, with dark blonde hair and striking blue eyes. There was nothing particularly memorable about his face, but something about him tugged at her memory in a way she couldn’t quite place. 

"I haven't done _anything!_ I don't know what you're talking about..." The Rebel's confusion gave way to an expression of dawning comprehension. Mara didn't trust that look. She tightened her grip on her blaster.

"You're Force-sensitive too!" he exclaimed. "You felt the Force disappear when you landed on this planet."

Mara stared at him over the barrel of her blaster. He was some sort of _Jedi_ wannabe, who could use the Force like she could, and fancied himself an expert. _Not likely,_ she thought. He even had a _lightsaber_ clipped to his belt. It wasn't inconceivable that there were other Force-sensitives out there, working for the Rebels, but she was surprised that he was so brazen about it. 

"How is this happening?" she demanded, still holding the blaster steady at his head. If he didn't have some device that was blocking her link to her master, then _what was going on?_

"I don't know," the Rebel shrugged, his hands still in the air. "Maybe it has something to do with the planet. Maybe it's the something to do with metals in the soils, or—I don't know!"

 _Focus, Mara,_ she reminded herself. He was her prisoner now, and they needed to get to the nearest settlement as soon as possible. Then she could finish her mission and get off this Force-forsaken planet. If the Rebel was right, if whatever it was that was blocking her connection to the Force was here on the ground, then all she had to do was leave the planet and her Master's presence would return to her. 

"Weapons on the ground. Including the lightsaber." She could hardly believe it when she'd spotted the weapon. They were rare, and, she couldn't help but comment, highly illegal.

"You've got one," he retorted as he placed the lightsaber and his blaster on the ground. Were all Rebels this mouthy? 

"I've got special dispensation from the Emperor!" she snapped, taking a slow step toward him to retrieve his weapons. 

He raised his eyebrows as he raised his hands again, and had opened his mouth to offer another smart remark when something exploded out of the trees above him. 

It happened so fast that Mara didn't have time to react. A sinewy predator leapt from the trees and launched itself straight for the Rebel, who twisted around, flung himself to the ground and narrowly avoided getting swiped by a deadly set of claws. It spun around to attack again, a long spiked tail whipping in the Rebel’s direction, barely missing him. The first shot Mara got off grazed the creature, and the second shot dropped it. The beast howled as it went down, thrashing for a short time before another bolt from her blaster made it go still. 

Mara took a deep breath as she watched smoke rise from the scorched body of the creature. She could hear the Rebel breathing heavily himself as he pulled himself to his feet, a few paces to her left. She steadied herself, getting her prisoner back in her line of sight, and raising her blaster to point at his head—

A second creature burst into the clearing. Mara spun toward it clumsily, her blaster tracking toward it, but not fast enough. The Rebel was already in motion, snatching up his lightsaber, the blue blade sweeping in a bright arc that cut down the animal as leapt for her. The creature's body hit the ground at the Rebel's feet. 

His triumphant expression fell from his face when he looked back into the barrel of her blaster.

"Cute. Now drop it."

How good was he with that thing? Good enough to deflect a point blank blaster shot? She didn't think so.

He sighed and lowered the lightsaber. "Look, it'll take the two of us to get through the forest to the nearest settlement. I can help. If you'd just give me the chance—"

_"Drop it."_

He put the weapon back on the ground. This time Mara didn't hesitate to pick it up and clip it to her own belt.

"Are you going kill me?" He was surprisingly testy for someone on the other end of Mara's blaster. 

"You're not my target," she said, lowering her weapon. There wasn't really any need to kill him, and if she turned him over to an Imperial interrogator he might provide valuable intel. "But if you try _anything,_ if I get any sense that you're even _thinking_ about trying anything, I won't hesitate to shoot you." 

"What should I call you?" he asked. 

She was tempted to tell him nothing, that what he called her in the short time he had left didn’t matter, but he had a point, they had a very long walk ahead of him, and he might need to alert her if any of those things attacked again.

“Jade,” she said. "Now get moving." 

He nodded and sketched a sarcastic bow. "After you."

\- -

Mara had a plan. The nearest settlement—barely more than a loose collection of warehouses—was several days away by foot, but from the settlement, she could pay for a shuttle that would transport them to a town the locals called Hyllyard City. Then she could book a trip to the nearest Imperial Garrison, where she would turn her prisoner over and return to Coruscant to her Master. The sooner they were off the planet, the better. They retrieved a survival pack and navigation equipment from the wreck of Mara's ship before setting off together towards civilization.

Mara was still feeling shaky after a day without the Emperor's presence in her mind. She had never been so vulnerable in her entire life, and she hated the feeling, a sickening feeling that never left her. On top of that, the Rebel had been right, it did take the two of them to fend off the vicious local wildlife. The second time one of the creatures attacked, he'd snatched the lightsaber right off her belt and engaged the predator until she could land the killing shot. She'd confiscated the weapon again, but had privately noted that he was better with the lightsaber than she had expected. Mara kept her blaster handy regardless. 

She hadn’t slept the first night, stim pills keeping her alert as she stood guard, her back against a tree, scanning the dark woods around them for any hint of an animal attack. The Rebel had regarded her warily, occasionally making comments and asking questions that Mara ignored. Eventually, he’d given up trying to get some sort of reaction from her and had gone to sleep, displaying that infuriating sloppy, casual arrogance that infected the Rebellion. How was he so sure she wouldn’t just shoot him in his sleep? Or that she wouldn’t just stand by if one of those creatures returned and mauled him as he slept? She glared across their camp at him, his features soft and unguarded in his sleep, lit by a single lantern they’d found in her survival pack.

Just who did this Rebel think he was, anyway?   

\- -

On the second day, the trees had thinned out and a wide plain stretched before them, rippling with bright yellow grass that came up to their knees. They'd had a brief but heated argument over whether to cross the plain or add several days to their trek by making their way around it. 

("It's too exposed,” Mara had insisted.

"But no one's even looking for us!" he’d said, face twisted in exasperation.

He was proving to be just as stubborn as she was.)

She graciously let him win this round, and they began to make their way across the plain, still alert to any aggressive wildlife, though they saw no sign of the creatures that had hunted them through the woods. Even the strange but harmless-looking lizards they'd spotting clinging to the trees were absent from this particular stretch of grassland. 

They had been traveling for about an hour when the Rebel jerked to a stop. Mara swung her blaster up to point at him, prepared to shoot if he offered any sign of resistance. He ignored her, his eyes unfocused, mouth slightly agape.

"Something's changed. Can you feel it?"

"What are you talking about?" She narrowed her eyes, keeping the blaster aimed at him. If this was some sort of trick—

"The Force. I can feel it again." He looked back at the forest. "Huh. So maybe it's the trees causing the disruptions in the Force. It came back once we got far enough away from the forest."

She had been so focused on keeping an eye on both her surroundings and her prisoner that she hadn't even noticed. Mara concentrated, reaching out to the Force as she bit down a flash of irritation at the fact that it had come so much easier to the man by her side. But he was right, whatever had been blocking their access to the Force had faded away. She could stretch her senses out again, beyond the confines of her physical form. Her first instinct was to reestablish her connection to her Master, but she still couldn't reach out beyond the planet's surface. There was only silence. As she strained to extend her senses, she felt the Rebel's presence beside her and reached out to brush his consciousness. 

Mara felt as though she'd stepped into a bright shock of sunlight after years in darkness. He was a supernova.

She had never sensed anything like it; the only Force users she had ever known were Vader, with his dark, simmering rage, and the overwhelming power of her Master. The Rebel shone with the Force, and she was drawn to him like a moth to a beacon. She found herself clutching his hand as she tried to soak up that warmth and instinctively jerked back, stepping away from that inviting light. He was staring at her in awe, and for a moment she was confused, wondering what he could have possibly sensed from her.

Where had a rebel this Force-sensitive _even come from?_

She brushed up against his mind again, catching wisps of emotions and little flickers of his thoughts, like sparks flashing out of the corners of her eyes. At that moment, she felt things click into place: the nagging feeling that she recognized him—something she read in a report—his odd choice to carry a lightsaber—

She jerked back again. She _knew._

"You're Luke Skywalker." She raised her blaster. "You're the man who blew up the Death Star."

He opened his mouth to deny it, and then realized the futility of lying to her with the Force flowing between them. "Yes." 

"You're responsible for the destruction of an Imperial base and the deaths of the Moffs aboard." Her blaster was steady, aimed point blank.

He looked uncomfortable. She could sense a flash of guilt, but it was guilt without repentance. 

"Yeah. I am."

Mara knew her duty. This man had cost the Empire great deal and must be brought in for his crime. He would face trial, be sentenced and then executed. The destruction of the Death Star had been such a major loss to the Imperial Army that the Emperor himself would probably oversee the proceedings. Skywalker's death would be a major victory for the Empire. She would be honored for bringing him to justice, and her Master would reward her personally—

Mara suddenly couldn't stand the thought of taking this man to his execution. She didn't want to be the one who extinguished that bright light, and she knew somehow that she couldn’t live with herself if she were the one that snuffed it out of existence. It just _felt_ wrong _._

She let her blaster drop. 

“You’re not going to shoot me?” He sounded surprised.

"You're not my target," she said sullenly as she brushed past him to continue on hiking.

She couldn’t just let him go. He was still a traitor to the Empire and a valuable prisoner, and it was her duty as a servant of the Empire to subdue any rebel she came across, even if he wasn’t her initial target. 

She’d decide later, when they were out of these blasted woods and back in civilization. She could spent the rest of their trek weighing her options, the rational decision against every instinct in her body screaming at her that turning in Skywalker was deeply _wrong_. 

As they continued their trek across the plain Mara caught herself reaching out to grasp Skywalker's hand, craving a brush of his force-bright presence against her mind. She caught the half-smile on his face and scowled in return, dropping his hand as if it had burned her.

\- -

She refused to speak to him for the rest of the day. Skywalker took her silence as encouragement to babble on and on about the Jedi's view of the Force, what he called the "light side" of the Force. Mara had never considered the Force in terms of light and dark. There was only her Master's compelling, encompassing power and the limited gifts he had coaxed out of her, tools for her to use as his Hand. She didn’t understand why Skywalker felt the need to share this information with her, blasphemous as it was, but Mara listened; it was useful to learn how the enemy thought, after all.

Once he'd started talking, he never seemed to stop. She was beginning to think he was the most singularly irritating person she'd ever met. 

"You haven't been doing this for very long, have you?" he said as they navigated across a swiftly running stream that cut through the grassy plain.

She gave him a cold look. "The Emperor has been overseeing my training my entire life."

"But you haven't had that many missions away from him, have you? You're about my age, aren't you? I haven't either. I've only been in the Alliance since—Yavin. I used to live on a farm."

Mara snorted. "The Alliance's greatest hero, a farm boy."

"That's me," he said cheerfully, reaching across to steady her as she slipped on stone. 

"I'm not green," Mara insisted, jerking out of his grasp. "I've  _killed_ people." 

"I've killed a lot more than you ever have."

Well, that was true. But Mara felt there had to be some difference between pressing a button to blow up a military base and slitting someone's throat in the dark. She didn't understand why he kept trying to draw some sort of comparison between them.

This time, he slipped, and Mara reached out a hand to catch him without even thinking about it. 

"Just shut up," she suggested. 

He didn't.

\- -

Mara was crouched at the foot of the Emperor's throne, shaking uncontrollably with bone-deep fear. Her Master's face was twisted in rage, his yellow eyes filled with disgust.

"You have failed me," he spat at her. He’d never been this angry with her, _never._ "You are nothing."

Lightning shot from his fingertips and consumed her as she screamed with pain—and with a gasp, Mara woke.

Her body was still locked in fear and she took a deep breath, willing herself to relax a fraction. She reached out to the Force to steady her, to drain away a little of the terror that had gripped her. The nightmare had felt so real.

"Are you okay?" Skywalker called out softly. He had reached out and turned up the small travel lantern that sat in the middle of their camp, a substitute for the firepit she had refused to let him build that night in the open space of the plains. The lamp cast a glow across his face, tight with concern for her.

Mara sat up and wrapped her arms around her torso, staring at the lamp, at the ground—at anywhere but at Skywalker. The forest wasn’t cold and yet she couldn’t stop shivering. She felt him reach out through the Force, offering her his warm presence, and she found herself babbling: "I don't—I don't want to face him. I...I've failed. I know how he treats failures."

She was appalled at her own confession of weakness and risked a quick glance at Skywalker. His face only held concern for her, an expression that Mara found bewildering. All she deserved was scorn, and now her prisoner was attempting to—comfort her? He shifted closer, looking like he wanted to place a reassuring hand on her shoulder but didn't quite want to risk it.

"You're not a failure," he said. She gave him a narrow glare and he didn't come any closer. 

"I lost my ship and I failed to eliminate my target. I broke contact."

Not to mention she was considering letting the man _who shot down the Death Star_ go free; she was considering it in spite of what she knew it would cost her and what it would cost the Empire. Even if she didn’t go through with it, that alone was a betrayal worthy of severe punishment.

He studied her. "But you're going to go back anyway, aren't you? Even though you know you'll be punished." 

"I _have_ to." What else was she going to do? "I don't have a choice." 

"It's the Emperor, isn't it. He's the one controlling your mind."

Mara stiffened, offended. "It's a _gift._ He can speak to me anywhere in the galaxy."

"But you can't block him out, can you?" He tilted his head, his gaze fixed on her. "You always have to listen to what he says. That sounds like control to me."

"You don't know anything about it," she snarled.

"Has he ever shown you any kindness?" 

Mara snorted. "It has nothing to do with kindness. I have a _purpose."_

"Serving the Empire? How can you do that after everything the Emperor's done?"

That was an obvious rebel argument. "His methods might be extreme at times, but he keeps order in the galaxy," she explained. "Without the Empire, civil war would tear the galaxy apart; the Clone Wars proved this. The Emperor is only working to prevent that sort of chaos."

"What about Alderaan?" 

_Alderaan._

Mara broke eye contact, dropping her gaze. An entire _planet,_ gone on Tarkin's whim. She had been privately appalled by the sheer _waste_ of Alderaan's loss—not that she shared that opinion with anyone at the Imperial court. It was treason to criticise Imperial policy. She had heard of many high-ranking officials and officers who had defected after the planet's destruction, but she had stayed strong by her master's side, trusting the Emperor's word that the Death Star would only be a deterrent, keeping insurgent systems in line. Tarkin was to blame, wasn't he? Tarkin was dead, and her Master would never allow that sort of thing to happen again. 

"I shouldn't have even fallen asleep." Mara yanked her travel pack closer and dug through the contents for the stim pills. "I should have been guarding the camp." It had been sloppy and careless to fall asleep in the presence of an enemy, and she wouldn’t do it again.

Skywalker sighed. "Well, _I'm_ going to sleep." He shuffled back to his side of their campsite. "Wake me if you need me to do a watch."

 _Not a chance,_ Mara thought. She didn't need to rely on him, she was the _Emperor's Hand._

She didn't need anyone.

\- -

They both came to a stop when they saw the line of trees marking the end of the plain. If the previous stretch of forest was any indication, proximity to the trees would blot out their sense of the living Force around them. Skywalker didn’t say anything, but she could sense his trepidation, mirroring her own.

She knew he could sense her reaction as well, and after a beat, Mara plowed ahead through the grass, focusing on the route ahead and not on the moment when one of her senses blinked out, and she lost touch with Skywalker’s bright presence.

Skywalker, followed, silent. She thought she heard an intake of breath behind her when they crossed into that Force shadow, but she ignored him, pushing ahead without pause.

They’d barely made it under the dense cover of the trees when one of the beasts attacked again.

It broke out of the underbrush, headed straight for Mara. She managed to get her blaster unholstered but didn’t manage a shot before it barreled into her. She felt her ankle roll as she fell, landing heavily on the ground, the weight of the animal knocking the breath out of her. She heard the thump of something hitting the creature, and it twisted toward the new threat, flinging itself off of her and towards Skywalker.

He’d found a large branch and his distraction gave her the opportunity to catch her breath and scramble at her belt. She’d dropped her blaster, but she still had the lightsaber, and without thinking, she threw it in his direction.

“Skywalker!”

He looked over in time to see the lightsaber drop near his feet. Thrusting the branch forward into the creature’s face gave him the opening to scoop up the lightsaber and activate it, and with a few slashes, the animal was dead on the ground.

Mara pushed herself into a sitting position, biting back a cry as she jostled her ankle. It wasn’t broken, but she’d sprained it badly in her fall.

Skywalker crouched over the beast, examining the corpse. “I think it was old,” he said. “Hunting alone.”

He looked over at her, and held up the lightsaber handle, placing it back on the ground with exaggerated deliberation. Then he frowned, picked up the lightsaber again and came over to where she was curled over her injured ankle. _Kriff, it hurt._

“Did you get hurt?”

_“Yes.”_

She kicked out at him with her uninjured leg, lashing out without bothering to aim. He simply stepped to the side and stood over her.

“It’s only a strain. _I’m fine.”_ She wasn’t sure she could stand on her own.

He tilted his head. “Let’s go back out of the range of the trees again, where we can access the Force.”

“Why?”

“Trust me,” he said.

 _“Trust_ you?” she spat. “I _don’t_ trust you!”

He leaned down and put an arm around her to lift her to her feet, and she let him. She _didn’t_ trust him, but she knew that he wouldn’t hurt her, either. Pain shot up her leg as she tried to put weight on the ankle, and she gritted her teeth, not wanting to give Skywalker the satisfaction of seeing her suffer.

“I don’t need your help,” she hissed through her teeth. “I can take a painkiller.”

“I know, and I think you should. But there’s something else I want to try too. It might help.”

He dug the medkit out of the pack and passed her a pill before stowing the packs in a tree and wrapping an arm around her waist. Together they hobbled back out of the trees and into the grass. This time she aware the second the Force flooded back into her, and she didn’t manage to stop the small gasp that escaped her mouth.

When Skywalker had decided that they were well out of range of the trees, he lowered her back onto the ground again, and sat down in front of her. “The Jedi had healing techniques,” he said, easing off her boot, pulling up the cuff of the flightsuit and wrapping his hands around her ankle. “I’ve only read about them.” He shot her an apologetic glance. “I’m not sure how they work, but I’d like to give it try.”

He closed his eyes, and she could feel him drawing on the Force, could sense it swirling around him, directing it toward her. She felt a cool rush against her ankle, and the throbbing pain began to abate. His technique was clumsy and lacked the elegance her Master commanded, though Mara wasn’t sure she could replicate the process herself. Her Master had never done anything like this for her. Mara had been injured during training before, not badly, but she’d spent her time smelling of bacta patches.

A light breeze brushed the tall grass, but otherwise, it was still, quiet. He sat, unmoving, his eyes closed, and she didn’t move either, simply watched him breathing in and out. The afternoon sunlight dusted his hair, his eyelashes, in gold.

The words tumbled from her lips before she could stop them. “My name is Mara.”

He opened his eyes. “Mara,” he said, with something like reverence, as though speaking a long forgotten prayer. His hands were warm on her ankle.

“I… have no idea what I’m doing—with the healing,” he said. “Did that help?”

She drew her foot away and gave it an experimental wiggle. “It does feel better,” she admitted.

She couldn’t give name to the emotion rushing off of him, but she wanted to bask in it; she wanted nothing more that to spend the rest of her days sitting here in the sunlight with him.

 _Stupid._ Scowling, she shifted away, ignoring the way his face fell.

“...Good,” he said, and he reached out for her, offering a hand to help her to her feet.

She pushed his hand away, rising awkwardly to her feet on her own. The ankle was still tender, and it ached as she shifted her weight from side to side to test its strength, but she could walk on it now.

“Thank you,” she said, staring at the ground.

She didn’t want to look up at the smile she knew was spreading across his face.

\- -

Mara's nightmares disappeared as soon as they were soon back in trees, in the dead zone without the Force to guide them. After days of hiking, fending off wildlife, falling in streams and sleeping on the hard dirt, the trees began to thin out and the ground sloped gently down toward a haphazard collection of buildings. They stood for a moment in silence, looking down at the settlement, both considering the paths the lay in front of them.

"Are you going to take me in?" he asked quietly.

"I _should_ hand you over to the Emperor," she said. "But—"

"But?"

"You were never my mission," she said. "We could part ways and no one would know." It was a lie. Palpatine would find out, and Mara couldn't even imagine his wrath when he did, what he might do to her. She’d never even considered disobeying him before. 

Skywalker beamed at her, and she shifted uncomfortably, jumping a little when he took her hand. She knew if they walked out of the trees she'd be able to feel the warmth of his presence in the Force, and for a moment, she longed for the touch of his mind. 

"You don't have to go back, you know," he said.  

"What do you mean?"

"You could come with me," he said. 

She stared at him, aghast, lost for words. 

He gave her a crooked smile. "Join the Alliance."

"You must be joking."

"They'd be thrilled to have you." His body language, improbably, told her _I'd be thrilled to have you join the Rebels._ Unbelievable. "You could be a great asset to the Alliance, and you'd never have to face Palpatine again. We’d protect you. You'd be free."

"And I'd lose everything," Mara whispered, her gaze dropping to the forest floor. 

"I lost everything before I joined the Alliance," Luke said. "And I gained so much more. If you came with me we could learn to use the Force together.”

Mara’s head snapped up to stare at him. Even without the Force to read him, she could tell his offer was genuine. No one had ever said anything like that to her before; Mara had never even contemplated the idea of working with an equal partner. Her Master treasured her and allowed the honing of her skills—at his discretion and under his command.

“You have a _choice,"_ he said softly. He held her gaze for a moment, and then turned and headed toward the settlement. She watched him walk away.

How could she possibly leave her entire world? How could she abandon her life of purpose and privilege and give it all up for a ramshackle rebellion? Spend the rest of her life running from the man who had been her Master, who had rasied her and taught her everything she knew?

And yet.

Yet.

"Hang on," she called. "I'll come with you."

\- -

They left Myrkr on a transport shuttle hauling passengers and cargo off the planet to the nearest civilized world. Mara sat next to Skywalker on a bench in the cramped passenger's hold, filled with shabby travelers who paid little attention to the pair’s equally ragged appearance. Even though they'd paid for a quick shower before they left Hyllyard city, their flight suits were torn and crusted with mud from days of hiking. 

As the mysterious influence of the planet faded, Mara felt the Force fill her once again, and with it, the connection to her Master sprung into life. She sensed the moment he reached out to make contact as he always had, his voice addressing hers across the galaxy. This was the moment when she had to make the choice to break his hold over her.

Mara threw her mental shields up, barring him from her mind. He had always told her her shielding was impeccable, he’d praised her for it, and now it would be put to the test _against him._ It was probably childish of her, but she took vindictive pleasure in turning his own techniques against him.

It was her first rebellion.

She could feel the tug in her head as he tested the connection between them that allowed him to have access to her anywhere in the galaxy. Mara fought back, drawing on the Force to strengthen her defenses against his invasion. He was there, twisting through her all her memories, the voice that was her constant companion. She erected barriers against him and tore out the connective tissues that formed the bond between them. The tether between them stretched to its breaking point and Mara felt a sudden, sickening wave of fear. What was she thinking, breaking her link to the Empire? She was nothing without her Master. She was a pathetic child, caught up in stupid ideas of independence and running off a rebel she barely knew just because he’d been _kind_ to her. She was a _traitor._

She caught a faint echo of emotion from the other end of the bond and she focused on it, trying to get a read on his reaction to her attempt to sever their connection. It was satisfaction. He was _gloating,_ feeding on her fear and self-doubt, reveling in her inner conflict. Mara could practically taste his delight. Was he _laughing_ at her? Mara’s stomach lurched. He had always told her that she was special, that there was no one else in the galaxy could take her place in his glittering Empire. Now he was treating her as though she were nothing more than a passing amusement.

Disposable.

She snapped the link.

Mara gasped, her head spinning. The whole world felt off balance, and there was a hollow, echoing place in her head where her Master had been, throbbing like an open wound. She struggled to remain conscious, biting the inside of her mouth until she tasted blood. She'd done it! She'd thrown him out! She focused desperately on that feeling of triumph to keep from passing out.

"Are you alright?" Skywalker murmured as she clutched his hand tightly and leaned her forehead against his arm. He shifted so that he could rub circles on her back. 

"Your girl have space sickness?" One of the nearby passengers asked Skywalker.

"Yeah, just a touch," Skywalker said. "She'll get better soon—I hope."

Mara felt something pushed into her other hand, and looked down to see the small bag the passenger had passed her. "In case you need to vomit." She must look _terrible._

"You'll be fine," Skywalker whispered. "It's going to be okay."

"Stay out of my head, Skywalker," Mara said, giving him a weak grin.

She folded into herself into the warm presence of his mind, letting all that light chase away the Emperor's shadows. It was terrifying. It was exhilarating.

It was going to be okay.


	3. Chapter Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please be warned that there is a major character death in this chapter. Things are going to get sad, and you don't have to keep reading if that's not your bag.

_Corsin_

"Now what?" Mara asked as they disembarked on the planet of Corsin. "I assume we can't take a public shuttle straight to your secret base?"

Her comment pulled a smile out of Luke, who seemed unconcerned. "I have some friends who are going to pick us up," he said. "I sent them a message before we left Myrkr." 

"Fine."

She still felt a little unsteady since she'd broken off her connection to Palpatine; colors in the spaceport around them seemed too bright, her head throbbed and she'd hadn't slept properly. She didn't say mention any of this, but Luke stayed close at her side, and suggested, _repeatedly,_  that they stop for lunch. She'd passed out several times during their flight and now he insisted on making her eat regular meals. She'd told him that it was a reaction to breaking the link to Palpatine, not her _calorie intake_ that was to blame, but he still went on and on about the hearty meals his Aunt Beru used to make. They stopped at a small diner and ordered lunch with the last of the credits she'd had on her when she crashed on Myrkr. 

After lunch, Luke's comm went off, a coded signal that only he could read, and they headed to a dock and watched as a decrepit Corellian freighter landed. If this was the quality of ship the Rebel Alliance was using, Mara thought, it was a wonder they posed any threat to the Empire at all. Mara stood by as Luke rushed forward to embrace Leia Organa as she came down the ramp, followed by the smuggler, Han Solo, who leaned a hand against a ramp pylon, and watched as Luke greeted the Princess. 

Mara had only ever seen the Princess from afar. As a member of the Senate, Organa had often been present at the Imperial Palace, but her path had never crossed Mara's. Mara had operated in the shadows, occasionally making an appearance at exclusive parties as a Palace dancing girl, the sort of parties that the incorruptible Organas did not attend. Leia Organa wasn't dressed as a princess now—now she was wearing the same drab clothes Mara imagined every rebel wore. And yet, she still managed to look regal and dignified, her hair impeccably braided and clothes neat, and Mara felt awkward in the grimy and mud-splattered flightsuit she’d been wearing for over a week. 

"This is Mara Jade—she's just defected from the Empire," Luke said, beaming with... pride? What had she done to be proud of?

"Welcome, Mara," Leia said, stepping forward and taking her hand.

Mara, taken aback by the warmth of her greeting, didn’t know how to respond. She stared down at their linked hands. Her head still hurt and she felt bleary and slow. 

The smuggler cut in before she’d managed to think up a reply. "I can't believe it, kid—we let you out of our sight for a minute, and you come back with another damsel in distress."

Despite her intention to play nice, at least until she knew where she stood with the rebels, Mara shot the smuggler a venomous glare. She only knew Han Solo from the reports she'd read, which were spotty anyway. He'd dropped out of the Imperial Navy to become an unimpressive pretty criminal, unworthy of notice until he fought in the battle against the Death Star. His bounty was less than Luke's or the Princess's. What she'd seen of him so far didn't impress her much. 

"How dar—"

"Mara's no damsel in distress," Luke cut in before she could insult his friends, the people she was hoping would take her in. "You should see her handle a blaster." 

"We're just happy that you decided to join our cause," Organa said. Mara mumbled some sort of vaguely grateful response and the Princess continued, "You'll have to go straight to HQ for debriefing, and then Cracken will need to interview you— "

"Whoa, slow down, your Highness," Solo said. "Give the girl a chance to catch her breath." 

"Procedures are important, Han." The princess glared at him. They were now arguing as though no one else were in the room.

"Yeah, but look at the poor kid, she probably needs to check into Medical before anything else."

Organa did look Mara over, concern written over her features. "Are you okay?"

Mara looked at Luke. _Just some psychic damage after severing a lifelong force bond,_ she thought, suppressing a hysterical giggle. All she wanted was to sleep for a week. Or a year.

"Mara's...had a tough time of it," Luke said gently. "It took a lot out of her to give up her ties to the Empire—”

“I’m just tired,” Mara cut in quickly.

She wasn’t sure _what_ sort of relationship Luke had with these two, but there were certain details about her break with the Empire that she wasn’t ready to share just yet. They might not be so welcoming if they knew how close her connection had been to the Emperor. She hoped she could impress them with the quality of her intel before they decided she was too much of a risk. 

"Well, we shouldn't stick around here long," Solo said, scanning the spaceport around them. "We need to get going before we attract any unwanted attention, if you know what I mean."

Mara swayed on her feet and Luke rushed to her side to hold her up. "It's worse than you're letting on, isn't it?" he asked, his face tight with concern.

"It's not... pleasant..." she said. 

Solo was talking again. "Get her inside, Kid." 

"We have a medkit inside the Falcon." Organa took hold of her other arm, and Mara didn't have the strength to pull away. 

She shook her head, which turned out to be a terrible idea. "Just need—rest."

Her vision was going dark around the edges. It was probably also a bad idea to pass out—again—in the middle of a spaceport, but Mara did it anyway. 

 

\- -

 

_Caprioril_

 

"Where _are_ they?" Mara hissed as she crouched behind the a stack of shipping containers, her eyes darting across the street to building known as Imperial Cap Base 4. There was no sign of movement at the front of the base; no signal from either Skywalker or Solo.

"Up there." Leia pointed to the top of the building, where Mara spotted Luke moving across the flat roof, his yellow jacket bright against the blue of the sky. It was a completely exposed position, and if Leia could spot him that easily, anyone else could.

"What is he doing? That's completely insane!" 

Leia gave her a sympathetic glance that said that she absolutely agreed with Mara, which Mara thought was a bit rich coming from her. She'd seen the Princess throw herself into half a dozen dangerous situations just as recklessly as Luke did. It was a wonder they hadn't all gotten themselves killed before she turned up to watch their backs.

Had she really been doing this for nearly a year?

"If he turns on his lightsaber I'll shoot him myself," Leia muttered, her eyes on the roof.

Mara shook her head. "Let me do it. I'm a better shot." 

On officially joining the Rebel Alliance, Mara had initially been assigned to Intelligence, where her unique talents could be of use to the cause, but for _some reason_ she was always being reassigned to missions led by Commander Skywalker or Solo. Like the current one. On this particular operation they'd been sent to Caprioril to intercept intel on weapons shipments to the new Imperial facility being built at Vespaxan, and things had been going well until their Intelligence operative, Targeter, had been picked up by stormtroopers during a random sweep of the city.

Targeter was being held in Cap Base B4, a small building in an outlying district of the city. The fact that she hadn't been moved to the main base in the center of the capital or even transferred off planet made it clear that the Imperials who had captured her hadn't figured out what a prize they had. With her infallible memory, Targeter was an asset the Alliance couldn't afford to lose; she was also Leia's foster sister, which meant that a half-cocked rescue mission had gotten underway the second Leia had gotten word.

Luke was supposed to be scoping out the back of the building while they watched the front, looking for an opportunity to break in as soon as Solo provided a distraction that would lure the troops out of the base. Sneaking up to the roof of said building hadn’t been in the plan at all.

The loud boom of an explosion going off half a district away made Mara and Leia jump, and they turned to see smoke rising from the direction of Cap Base B6. Solo's idea of diversionary tactics was about what you'd expect. Mara, had she been in charge, would have called for a subtler touch. She would have simply snuck into the capitol building by herself and disposed of the governor general in charge of all the Imperial bases on the planet. A straightforward assassination; all she'd have to do would be to cut off the head of the beast and watch the chaos trickle down—Wait. No. Those were Palpatine's methods, and she was no longer Palpatine's creature. She was no longer expected to execute lonely and bloody missions, missions for the monster at the heart of the Empire she was now committed to bringing down. Now she was required to work with a team, even if she disagreed with the team’s theatrical tactics.

Still, Solo’s methods, crude and over the top as they were, had been effective. Mara and Leia watched as troops poured from the base, heading in the direction of the sirens and noise. “That’s our cue,” Leia said dryly. There would still be guards posted at the front gate, so they swung around the side of the building and approached the back. It had been Luke’s job to secure the back entrance, and there he was, swinging the door open cockily from the inside.

“Show off,” Mara said. He just grinned at her.

“There’s a freight turbolift that comes down straight from the roof,” he explained as they began to make their way through the back passages of the base, moving fast and attempting to attract as little attention as possible. The holding cells were on Level 3, and they left a trail of stunned personnel behind them. The security on the base was pathetic, but what did she really expect from a sixth-rate garrison on an insignificant planet?

Mara was the team’s slicer, since she knew the most about how Imperial security systems worked and how to break them. In her past occupation, she’d had backdoor codes to any network in the entire Empire, but Palpatine had rendered them obsolete after she defected. She wasn’t the galaxy’s best slicer by any standard, but she’d been trained to understand those systems since she was a child, which gave her an edge that team was happy to take advantage of in these sorts of situations. It only took a couple of minutes—long minutes, with Luke and Leia standing tense on either side of her—at the security terminal for Mara to break into the system, locate the holding cell that held Targeter, and slice the code that locked that particular cell.

“Winter!” As soon as Mara had broken the lock, Leia rushed in and embraced her sister. “Are you alright?”

"I’m fine. They were still in the softening up stage," Winter said. "I'd kill for something to eat, though."

Her voice was as calm and measured as always, and she looked unharmed but exhausted, her jumpsuit rumpled and her short white hair in need of a wash. 

Leia laughed, clearly relieved. “We’ll take care of that.” 

Mara eyed the reunion from behind the terminal.

They were all orphans, the four of them—five if you counted Solo, wherever he was—but Leia and Winter had still had families that loved them, before Alderaan had been destroyed. They had had a mother and father who had raised and nurtured them throughout their childhood. It was like a secret language between them that Mara couldn't translate. 

“Let’s get going,” Luke said. “We need to get out of here before anyone searches this floor.” 

“Wait,” Mara called the team to a halt. “Whoever installed the security system here was lazy.” There was a part of her, a very _small_ part, that was indignant that the Empire had fostered such incompetence, and _all_ of her wanted to punish them for it. “It only took me a couple of minutes to break it. If I could get to a terminal linked to the central computer, I could download all the data we were sent to Caprioril to find.”

Luke and Leia exchanged glances.

“It’s an opportunity that we can’t pass up,” Luke said. It had been, after all, their primary mission.

“Winter’s exhausted. We can’t drag her back through the base,” Leia countered.

“Winter’s right here,” Winter said mildly.

Leia had a point though; Winter would be a liability if she was as tired as she looked.

“You and Winter take the freight turbolift and comm Han to pick you up on the roof,” Luke said. “I’ll get Mara to a terminal.”

“Take the left hall and go through the seventh door," Winter said. "There’s a corridor that should take you to a series of offices. The third or fourth room should have an unattended terminal.” Her memory could be uncanny sometimes, but it was useful.

There was the muffled boom of another explosion going off somewhere in the district. At least Solo was keeping himself entertained.

“Let’s go.” 

It didn’t take then long to follow Winter’s directions and find a terminal for Mara to slice into. It was some junior Lieutenant’s station, and Mara made quick work of breaking into his programs, still disdainful of Caprioril’s security measures. From there, it wasn’t hard to find the files they needed and load them onto a datacard. Mara yanked every file she could think of: reports, transmissions, codes.

A transmission came through during the download and Mara almost dismissed it, her hand hovering over the button before it occurred to her what it meant for the other half of the team. _“Shavit,”_ Mara muttered a curse she’d picked up from Han. An incoming shuttle of backup troops was landing on the roof, replacing the troops that had left the base to attend to Solo’s explosions.

“What is it?”

“Leia and Winter are in trouble.”

Their commlinks were on blackout while they were still in the building, and Mara wasn’t sure it was worth the risk to activate them now. Any halfway decent comms officer could trace the signal within the base and locate the entire team within minutes. They’d all be trapped. As she stared blankly at the screen, considering their options—none of them good—it occurred to her that she had another, untraceable way to contact Leia.

“I’m going to try something,” she told Luke. “Don’t interrupt me.”

Only a year ago Mara could communicate across the galaxy with only a thought, but she’d lost that ability when she’d severed her link to Palpatine, and while she’d never tried to connect through the Force with anyone else except Luke, she had to give it a try. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She opened herself to the Force in the way she and Luke had been practicing and reached out until she could sense Leia’s presence. _Leia? Leia, can you hear me? Turn around! Don’t take the turbolift to the roof!_

Through the connection she thought she sensed a return burst of confusion and then of assent. She wasn’t sure that Leia had understood exactly what had happened, but she got the message, more or less. Mara would probably have a lot of explaining to do later. 

“Are they okay?” Luke asked as Mara slowly opened her eyes. He was watching her intently.

“I think so—yes.”

“Good. I think we need to get out of here.”

Mara had downloaded a map onto a datapad she’d swiped from the office, and they abandoned the terminal and followed a convoluted but less populated route through the building. It seemed to be working until Luke skidded to a halt, and Mara, her attention on the map, nearly fell over him. He gestured for silence, and then she heard it: the sound of a squadron of troopers—probably the new unit that had arrived on the roof—coming down a nearby hallway. Luke grabbed her and pulled her into the closest maintenance closet, little more than a locker with barely enough room for two people to fit inside. His hand slid around her back, holding her close as they both waited for the the troopers to pass. After several long, tense, minutes, the sound of marching faded in the distance, and they both relaxed a fraction. As Mara shifted in the small space to face Luke, his hand slid down her back to rest at her hip.

She gave his hand a pointed look. “Getting comfortable?”

He blushed but shot her a bold look. “Are you?”

Mara stared at him, taken aback. He smiled at her.

It was a good smile. Mara _liked_ it. 

"I'm not a nice girl, Skywalker," Mara said, her voice low.

"I fly for the Rebellion," Luke said. "None of the girls I know are _nice_ girls."

“Yes, but—” And suddenly, he was kissing her, with more confidence and tongue than Mara would have expected. For a few minutes, she pressed back and then she broke away. "Tara in OPS is nice."

"I don't _want_ Tara in OPS," Luke said, exasperated. 

She yanked him closer, nipping hungrily at his mouth. His hands were everywhere, ghosting down her back, curving around her hips and then sliding up her waist. Their utility belts banged against each other, and his lightsaber was digging uncomfortably into her hip.

She broke away again, glaring at him. “Skywalker, we _need to go.”_

He looked a little dazed. “Oh. You’re right.”

They tumbled out of the closet and into the hallway, and they were off again. Luke grabbed Mara’s hand as they ran, and though it wasn’t the first time he’d done that on a mission, it sent a jolt through her.

Using her map, Mara had located a side exit that wasn’t too heavily guarded, and between her blaster and his lightsaber, they made it out without injury. The moment they cleared the building, Luke was hailing Solo on his commlink. "We're out of the building, where are you?"

Solo directed them to a side street several blocks south of Cap Base 4. It was deserted when they reached it, and they peered cautiously up and down the block as they waited to hear from him. Several long minutes went by until a large landspeeder came racing down the alley and jerked to a stop in front of them. It looked as though it had once been two separate speeders that had been joined together by some unfortunate accident. Force knew where Solo had stolen the thing.

"So nice of you to join the party," Han drawled, grinning all over his face.

"Took your time about it," Mara snapped back instead of thanking him. She enjoyed giving Solo a hard time and she knew he liked her for it, though she didn't quite understand why. Having friends was still a relatively new concept for her.

And her and Luke—that was something different, now. Mara wasn’t sure what it was, but it gave her a warm feeling unlike any she’d felt before.

Mara was relieved to see Leia and Winter already in the backseat as she and Luke leapt inside and the speeder tore down the block. They weren’t out of danger yet, but Luke and Han were already laughing and tossing wisecracks back and forth. Leia was rolling her eyes at something one of them had said, while Winter just smiled in her serene way. 

She felt Luke's hand slip into hers again. 

They were a reckless, impossible, _splendid_ team.

Her team.

 

_\- -_

 

_Hoth_

 

 _"Kreth!"_ Han shouted as he turned a corner and nearly ran smack into a couple in the midst of a heated embrace. "Can't you two just find a room?"

Luke and Mara broke apart, his hand slithering out of her winter jumpsuit as she jerked up the zipper. She knew they were both flushed, and her swollen lips tingled in the cold air. 

"You can't neck in every corridor on the base!" Han had a hand on his hip, the other making dramatic gestures in the air. "This is a military facility! The ground crew are starting to list you two as a common hazard." 

Luke had the decency to look somewhat abashed, but Mara turned and glared at Han. "Just because—"

“Indeed.” Before she could launch into a retort, C3-PO’s golden head popped out from behind Solo. “Regulation 234/D-6 strictly prohibits the blocking of passages for unlicensed activities.”

Mara groaned and leaned her forehead against Luke’s shoulder. She’d grown up with protocol droids; they were almost as common as courtiers in the Imperial Palace, but still, she’d never met one as singularly annoying as Threepio. Luke's shoulder shook as he began to laugh. 

 _“Unlicensed activities?”_ he chortled. 

“Why yes, Master Luke, the specific regulations regarding fraternization—”

“We get the picture, Threepio!” Luke cut him off before they were subjected to a lengthy lecture on the topic. It had happened before. _Several_ times. 

"That's enough, kids."  Han pointed at Luke. _"You've_ got a patrol to run,” and then at Mara, “...and _you've_ got to report to OPS before her Highness has to come looking for you."

“Better you than me,” Mara said to the two of them. “Tauntauns smell.”

Luke flashed her a put-upon look, which she ignored. It wasn’t exactly a coincidence she’d never pulled patrol duty; she’d used whatever leverage she had with Rieekan to get out of it.

"I'll see you later, Farmboy," she said, stealing a kiss before she sauntered off toward OPS, where there were transmissions from Intelligence to decode and file, and hopefully hot caf. 

Things were quiet in OPS when Mara arrived, which gave Leia the opportunity to launch into an elaborate rant about General Solo's irritating qualities, which Mara only half listened to. She’d heard all before; the entire base had heard it all before. 

Everyone on Hoth had different ways of coping with the tension of being in close quarters without reprieve for months on end, bored and cold. Han and Chewie tinkered with the Falcon, Leia ranted about Han, Mara and Luke worked on honing their Force skills, and, as Han put it _, "_ kriffed _on every_ frelling _surface available."_ Mara sometimes wondered if Han and Leia wouldn’t be better off if they just kriffed all that tension out of their systems, and put the rest of the base out of their misery.

It wasn't a factually accurate statement anyway, she reflected, but until the Alliance abandoned Echo Base, they had the time to give it a try.

 

\- -

 

_Dagobah_

 

She _hated_ Dagobah.

Stupid tiny Jedi masters and their stuffy traditions.

Stupid _kriffing_ Force visions that convinced Luke to abandon her in this _mudhole_ and go off to be hero.

“This is the stupidest idea you’ve ever had, Skywalker!” Mara trailed after Luke, back and forth between his X-wing and their camp, as he packed for the flight to Cloud City. He was going after Han and Leia, and he was insisting on going alone. They'd been fighting about it all day, and he’d shot down all of her reasons to join him and any of her attempts to persuade him not to go.

"Han and Leia are in danger, Mara." 

It wasn’t that Mara wasn’t frantic with worry over Leia and Han as well, she _was_ sick with worry for her friends, but every fiber of her being was screaming that Luke going off to rescue them was _wrong._ She knew down to her bones that it would lead to certain disaster, that some horrible fate waited for him in Cloud City. She knew that Luke could feel it too, but he wouldn’t _listen._

"Yoda _told_ you not to go!" She said. "If you're not going to listen to me, listen to him." 

"I’ve heard you call Yoda a little green gnome and another word I'm not going to repeat." He made a face as he pulled a snake out of the X-wing's landing strut and tossed it into a bush. 

Yoda and Mara didn’t exactly get along. Although he’d always treated them equally, Mara had the nagging feeling that he wished he could focus more exclusively on training Luke, and that she was a distraction that only wasted his time. She followed his lessons and endured his tests, but she'd also made her resentment clear to everyone, and that hadn't improved relations between her and their new Jedi master.   

"That doesn't mean he isn't right, Luke.” 

“They were being tortured, Mara,” Luke said softly. “I can’t let that happen.” 

She hadn't witnessed the vision herself, but he'd shared his sense of Leia and Han's pain across the bond between them, and she knew exactly how much it ate away at him that he wasn't there to help their friends. 

“But Yoda said that the future is always in motion. It might not happen at all. Besides, it's clearly a trap.” If they’d been trapped by Vader than Luke could just as easily be captured and tortured as well, and Mara couldn’t bear the thought of what Vader, or worse, _Palpatine,_ would do to Luke if they had him in their grasp. It was the sort of thing that gave her nightmares, that tore her out of sleep, gasping with fear. 

"That's why I'm going alone. You can come and rescue me if everything goes wrong."

She wanted to tell him she’d never come to his rescue, just in order to spite him, but instead, she just stared at him unhappily, hunched over her crossed arms.

"I'll be back," Luke said, flashing her a crooked grin. "I promise." 

"You'd better be," Mara blustered to cover her anxiety. 

“Hey,” he said, pulling her close and ducking his head to press his forehead to hers. Mara closed her eyes and leaned into him. “I promise.”

\- -

She felt his death.

Mara cried out as it sliced through her meditation, causing her to fall out of the pose she had been holding and into the dirt. There was a flash of deep despair and the feeling of falling—the wind battering against a body whose life was failing fast—there was a blinding pain in her head and then silence. Her connection to Luke had been torn away and she lay convulsing on the ground.

 _LukeLukeLukeLuke,_ she screamed into a mental void. 

There was no answer.

She must have passed out for a while, but she wasn't sure, time now seemed blurred and irrelevant. She could feel Yoda reaching out to her through the Force, the touch of his mind offering comfort, but she furiously pushed him away. She lay there until the pain in her head subsided to a throbbing ache and then lurched to her feet and started running, blind with grief and barely aware of her surroundings. 

She had been running wild through the swamp for days, neither eating or sleeping, when Luke appeared.

She staggered to a stop, staring at the transparent shape that hovered in front of her. _Wonderful._ The hallucinations had started.

"I'm not a hallucination, Mara."

"Stay out of my head, Skywalker," she snapped automatically.

He grinned, his ghostly form shimmering the weak Dagobah light.

"You're dead, aren't you? I _felt it."_

His smile fell.

"It was Vader, wasn't it? I'll _kill_ him."

"No, Mara. Please. Don't go after him."

"Damn you, Skywalker! Why didn’t you stay? Why wouldn't you let me come with you!"

Luke smiled sadly. "I had to face Vader alone. He's my father, Mara."

"What?" Mara gaped at him. "But the Emperor never told me—" Yet another fact the Emperor had concealed from her. His many betrayals still left her reeling, after all this time.

"Darth Vader was Anakin Skywalker before he fell. He was my father. He was manipulated by the Emperor and turned to the dark side." What he was saying seemed impossible, but the Force told her it was true. "Vader gave me choice, to join him or die. I could never join him, Mara. I'm so sorry."

She shook her head and scrubbed at the tears flowing down her face. Mara Jade didn't _cry._

"I don’t have long. I came to say goodbye."

"You can't go!” Mara sobbed. “It's so empty in my head." 

"I can't stay," he said simply. Her eyes shut as his ghostly hand lifted to trace her cheek. "I love you, Mara."

 _"Luke,"_ she gasped.

And he was gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> He's dead, Jim.


	4. Interregnum

_Hyperspace_

There was only a single holding cell on Vader's shuttle. The bare metal floor was cold, and Mara and Ben huddled together in the corner of the cell as the ship traveled through the void towards whatever destination Vader had chosen. Towards the Emperor.

"Remember your shielding," Mara spoke quietly to Ben as she held him close, going over everything she had taught him. "Remember what I taught you about mind probes—"

"I _remember,_ Mom," Ben snapped. 

Mara almost smiled. Even terrified and in the face of an uncertain future, Ben could be as impatient as his father had been, and as quick with a retort as either of them. Her fingers skimmed affectionately over his undercut hair and he leaned into her touch in spite of his outburst. They both wore the ragged patchwork and layered clothes of scavengers, the lowest rung of galactic society. They were nothing but fugitives, after all. 

"Patience, Ben. Don't let fear control you," she murmured, as much a reminder to herself as to him. She struggled to hold on to the peace and calm that gave a Jedi strength, even though she was desperately afraid. 

All her nightmares coming true...

"He wants to kill us, doesn't he?" Ben said quietly. “Like he killed my dad.”

"He wants to kill _me."_

Mara wasn’t sure what the future held for Ben, but she was sure that she wouldn’t be spared. Her death would be slow and painful, and Palpatine would undoubtedly use her suffering against her son. Nothing would turn him to the dark side faster than watching his mother tortured to death, and that haunted Mara more than the thought of what waited for her. Her stomach twisted as she imagined what was in wait for Ben, and she took a deep breath, willing herself not to throw up. 

Mara sensed Vader approach the cell minutes before the door opened, which gave her time to give Ben one last word of warning. "Don't say a word to him," she said as she rose to face Vader, shifting in front of Ben to shield him with her body as the massive Sith lord swept into the cell, the rasping sound of his breath filling the small space of the cell.

Mara’s stomach dropped when she saw the lightsabers hanging on Vader’s belt. His own was worn on his left hip and on the opposite hip there were two more, her own lightsaber and Luke’s, hanging from his belt like a trophy. _Luke's lightsaber._ Vader must have salvaged it from Besip after his death. Ben squeezed her hand, recognizing the familiar tenor of her grief.

She could feel Vader prodding at her mind. _Let him try,_ she thought grimly.

"Where are you taking us? Why haven't you killed me?" She was sure she already knew the answer. 

"I would not deny the Emperor the pleasure of dealing with his traitorous Hand," Vader said. Ben shrunk closer to her. 

Mara snorted. "At least I'll get a chance to spit in his face." 

"You are an insolent child,” Vader leveled a finger at her. “Ungrateful for the honor of serving the Emperor.”

"Honor?” Mara scoffed.There was a sickening exhilaration in taunting Vader. “He brainwashed me and controlled every part of my life. Even my _mind._ Do you really want that for your grandson?"

"My grandson," Vader breathed. His mask tilted as he turned from her to gaze down at Ben. The wonder that poured off of him was tainted by an overwhelming desire to possess and control. "He will have a life of privilege and power. A life that you threw away like the treacherous scum you are."

"I was his _slave,"_ Mara hissed at Vader. She felt a strange surge of emotion from the Sith. There was something there, something that she could use against him, but she wasn't quite sure what it meant. "I thought that I was so important, but I was disposable, wasn't I? I was nothing but a toy."

"You were an experiment." 

Mara barked a laugh. "That experiment didn't go as he expected, did it?"  

"It yielded...unexpected results." 

Mara felt sick at the thought of what twisted schemes Palpatine might have planned for her. "When you found out about Luke and I did you decide I was just an incubator for the next Skywalker son?" Her rage felt like a crashing wave, barely held in check. "Is that how you knew about Ben?"

"Skywalker’s son was also unexpected.”

“He’s _my_ son.”

“He has the great power of the Skywalker line.” Vader looked at Ben again. “A power that he will use to serve the galaxy as did I.”

Mara's eyes narrowed, as the pieces began to fall into place. "You want him for yourself. You want him to be _your_ apprentice. But I know how the Sith work, you always work in pairs. You'll kill Palpatine so that you can have Ben for yourself."

"He's _my_ grandson."

"You killed his father!" she screamed at him.

A blast of rage emanated from the Sith and the breath was knocked out of her as she was pinned up against the wall in Vader's Force grip. She fought to suck in air as the pressure sealed her to the wall. 

It was Ben's frantic _"Mom!"_ that distracted Vader. His Force grip loosened and she sunk to the floor, coughing. "Mom, mom, are you okay?" She pulled Ben to her, sucking in deep lungfuls of air with her face burned into his hair. 

Vader wasn't simply angry. Mara had caught a hint of grief there as well, a whisper behind the raging storm, so quiet so could barely sense it. She opened herself to Force, opened herself to that storm of emotion.  _Grief._ Not for himself, but for Luke. He regretted Luke's death.

Well, to hell with him. 

When she’d caught her breath, she straightened, glaring up at Vader, her arms still curled protectively around Ben. Time to try a different tack. 

"How old were you when the Jedi took you? Ben's age?" She only knew scraps of his history; that he'd been taken into the Jedi as a boy, and had trained with Kenobi before he fell, but she could tell from the emotion swirling around him that she'd scored a hit. “You’d offer him up to the Emperor like you were offered up to the Jedi? How well did that go?”

He was quiet for a moment before he spoke. “Sidious will take him as an apprentice or I will. He will face the Emperor either way.” 

“How can you do this? Give him your _grandson?”_

"I have no choice," Vader said. "You will both be taken to the Emperor." 

Where she’d meet her death, and Ben would be corrupted by the Dark Side; Vader believed it was inevitable. She knew she had little chance of swaying the Sith, but she had to ask anyway.

"Please." She had never begged for anything in her life, but at this moment, nothing mattered more. "Please don't let Ben watch. _Please._ Don't let your grandson witness his mother's death."

"It is your destiny to face the Emperor, as it is his." 

Mara felt her last chance at sparing Ben slip away. 

He left them alone again.

She felt Ben grip her hand tightly. "What happens now, Mom?"


	5. Chapter Three

_Dagobah_

She was going to kill Darth Vader.

She was going to hunt him down and make him pay for what he'd done to Luke, what he'd done to _his son._

She dragged herself back to to the tent she and Luke had shared near Yoda's hut before she collapsed into deep, sweet unconsciousness. She wasn't sure how long she slept, but when she woke she found a small pot of soup by the flap of the tent. Otherwise, she saw little sign of the Jedi Master, who was lost to his own grief. He stayed in his hut, and she sulked around the campsite near her Z-95. 

For several days she did nothing but watch the rain drip down the edges of her tent, occasionally nibbling on a ration bar. She told herself that as soon as she recovered from her grief-driven flight through the jungle, she was going to finish her training, and then set out to kill Vader. It wouldn't soothe the ache in her head and heart, but it would be the last thing she could do for Luke. 

But she was still so tired. She was tired and sore in places she had no right to be sore. She crawled out of the sleeping bag that she and Luke had shared before—no, she wasn't going to cry again. When she stood her head swam and she dropped right back down again. Was she ill? Was she—?

No. No no no no no no.

Mara tore through the Alliance-issued medkit she'd retrieved from her Z-95 Headhunter and moved mechanically through the testing process. She already knew what the readout would say, even before the digital Aurebesh formed on the readout. They'd both been on contracepts, and she _thought_ they'd been careful, but it hadn't been enough. 

 _Kriffing hell._ She stared at the readout in her shaking hand. There were pills in the medkit that would induce termination and Mara reviewed them listlessly, the blue pill pack in her shaking hand, though she already knew wouldn't put them to use. She was carrying _Luke's baby._ A thrill shot through her, a shocked laugh bubbling up out of her mouth. Kriffing. Hell.

She knew nothing about children; childrearing was _not_ one of the things her training as the Emperor's pet assassin had covered. Her knowledge of happy childhoods began and ended with the stories that Luke and Leia had told her. _She_ didn't even know the basics. What did babies do all day, anyway? 

What she did know was that her plan to kill Vader was finished, just like that. She couldn't risk the life of her child on a reckless quest for revenge. Ever since she defected, she knew that she'd been placed on a list of targets wanted by the Empire. Perhaps not very high on the list, not as high as Luke or Leia, but all that would change if Vader knew what she carried. He’d hunt her to the end of the galaxy. 

She tore through the swamp until she reached Yoda's hut, to find the diminutive Jedi Master, seated on a fallen branch not far from his hut, in conference with another apparition. Luke’s old friend, Obi-Wan Kenobi.

"Mara," the ghostly Jedi master greeted her, his voice heavy and solemn. "I'm sorry for your loss." 

Mara did not want his sympathy.

“Luke’s dead," she snarled. "Don’t give me your condolences. He worshiped you, and look where it got him!" The old man hung his head as her anger boiled out of her. "He was so invested in your cause! You never told him Vader was his father, and it got him killed! You should have told him! You should have prepared him for—" she choked back a sob, unable to continue her diatribe.

"Mistakes, we made," Yoda sighed, looking frail and small.

"Mistakes?"

"Understand, you do not!" Yoda snapped. "Massacred, our people were, _destroyed,_ our way of life." The outburst seemed to take a toll on him, and his small shoulder fell as he sunk into himself. 

"We were left with very few options," Kenobi said. "Vader and the Emperor must be stopped, butthe Son of Skywalker... was not ready to face his father." 

_"I felt him die."_

"A nascent force bond," the ghost sighed. "The severing of such a link would be... painful."

 _"I know._ It isn’t my first time." It wasn't the same at all, but she wasn't sure how many more time she could live through a bond being torn out of her head. 

Yoda and Obi-Wan exchanged a look, obviously deeply uncomfortable at the topic of her former master. 

"Heal in time, you will."

"And then what?" What twisted expectations did they have for her, now that Luke was gone? 

"Finish your training, you must." Yoda straightened, with new purpose. "Then guide the other Skywalker to us, you will.”

“The other—?” They were talking nonsense now. 

"Luke was not the only Skywalker, Mara Jade," Kenobi said. "His sister will carry on his legacy and bring down the Emperor's reign of evil."

"His sister? Luke does have any siblings." 

"Luke had a twin sister. They were separated at birth to prevent Vader from discovering their existence. Luke's sister was adopted by the Organas and raised as their daughter." 

 _"Leia?"_ Mara's jaw dropped. 

She began to shake again, enraged that the Jedi had kept Luke and Leia from each other; Luke had died never knowing he had a sister. In that moment, she hated all of them. Yoda and Obi-Wan for their schemes and lies; Han and Leia for getting themselves into an impossible situation that had lured Luke to his death. She hated herself for staying behind. Perhaps if she had gone with him, he would have made it out alive.

"Strong in the force, she is. Like her brother." 

"You will bring her here to be trained by Yoda to defeat Vader and the Emperor."

"No, I won't." Mara knew she sounded petulant, and she didn’t care. They had all been tools of a war that none of them had chosen.

"Perhaps you misunderstand the vital importance—" 

"I'm _pregnant,"_ she spat. 

 _That_ took them by surprise. Mara was pleased to see both Jedi masters completely flummoxed by her revelation. 

"Unforeseen, this was."

"You _think?"_

“This only makes Leia's training even more vital!” Obi-Wan was back on course again. "You will carry on the Skywalker's family line, and she will bring about the downfall of Vader and the Emperor.”

She knew that she couldn’t face Vader in her condition, but she didn’t have to be happy about it. "Am I supposed to be grateful for that?" she spat. 

“The Skywalker line is an extremely powerful one," Obi-Wan said. "It was once foretold that it would bring balance to the Force. Only a Jedi of great power and skill can defeat the Emperor.”

“And that’s all I’m good for, carrying the next Skywalker?”

“A powerful Jedi, you could be too,” Yoda said. “If your training, you complete. Stay. Finish your training and raise your child in the way of the Jedi. Take on her father, Leia will.”

"No. I'll stay and train but I'm _not_ dragging Leia into this nasty Jedi feud."

She wasn’t going to be responsible for the death of another Skywalker. She had failed Luke when she didn’t follow him to Cloud City. They’d all failed Luke. She wouldn’t do that to Leia.

Yoda and Kenobi exchanged a look and Mara knew the argument wasn't over by a long shot; she had a very long nine months ahead of her.

 

\- -

 

_Beris_

 

Mara was running out of time.

She stopped and leaned against the side of a building as another contraction seized hold of her. They were getting closer together and more intense. She needed to get to the med center, _now._

She had left Dagobah in spite of Yoda's insistence that she finish her training and recruit Leia, and made it to the unremarkable planet of Beris, where, at the very least, a med center would be available to her. She wasn't going to deliver her baby in a _swamp._ If only the med center hadn't been on the other kriffing end of town.

She focused on the line of landspeeders in front of her and picked out her target, an unattended speeder halfway down the block. She used the Force to pop the lock and eased the door open so that she could lean into the speeder to hotwire the control panel on the dashboard. She grunted as she maneuvered around her enormous belly, pausing at one point to grip the side of speeder with white-knuckled fingers as she rode out another contraction. She had nearly finished when she was yanked away from the speeder by its irate owner, who bellowed at her in his native tongue.

In her condition, she couldn’t fight him off, but she still knew dozens of ways to incapacitate most beings in the galaxy. It took no time at all; a quick kick here, a jab there. Even minutes away from dropping a Skywalker, Mara _could do this._ Even so, she had a catch her breath afterward, before she left the speeder's owner sprawled gasping on the ground and climbed clumsily into his vehicle. The speeder took off, Mara punching the speed as far as it could go, pushing the machine to its limits. The city flew by. 

Distracted by another wave of pain, she took the last turn too sharply. She yanked hard on the steering yoke, and the speeder was nearly out of control, jerking wildly as she fought to bring it to a stop in front of the med center. The hoverlifts on one side of the machine blew out and it tilted dangerously to the side. Her satchel slipped off her shoulder, spilling its contents across the floor of the speeder. She shoved the door open and tumbled gracelessly out of the tilted speeder, not bothering to stop and gather up her belongings. As she staggered through the doors of the med center every person in the reception area turned to stare; Nurses, security droids, and a small group of men who looked like they'd just come from a bar fight clustered around a reception droid.

"Welcome to Medcenter 38." A stern-looking nurse bustled up to assist her. "We need your identification before we admit you."

Mara gritted her teeth and focused through the pain. "You don't need to see my identification." She’d left it in the satchel in the speeder and she wasn’t planning on going back for it now. 

The nurse blinked. "I don't need to see your identification," she said blankly.

A security droid zipped over. "Incorrect." It buzzed. "All patients must submit identification."

 _Blast._ She couldn't bluff a droid, and there was _no time._ "It's in the kriffing speeder," she growled through another wave of pain.

"There you are, darling." Suddenly, a tall dark haired man with sharp blue eyes stepped beside her and took her elbow. He had been in the bar fight group, Mara realized, and had probably been watching the entire interaction. His other arm was in a sling. "I was so worried.” Mara stared at him, dazed, but before she could think of any sort of response he turned to the nurse and said in a voice of authority: "I insist that my wife be admitted immediately. My men will get her ID from the speeder."

Another man peeled away from the group at the counter and ducked outside at his nod; the nurse was conciliatory. Whomever he was, this man had influence. Mara gripped his arm tightly as the contractions intensified. She didn't want this stranger beside her, no matter how kind. She wanted _Luke._

"Damn you, Luke," she muttered.

"It's _Talon,_ darling."

\- -

"Good morning."

Mara opened her eyes to find the gentleman from the night before seated casually in a chair placed beside her bed. He wore a plain blue shirt and unmarked spacer's jacket, his neat dark hair lightly flecked with grey. He held a datapad in one hand, his other arm bound in a sling. 

"Where—" She croaked, reaching out through the Force. During her pregnancy, she had become used to touching her baby's presence inside her womb, and it was a strange sensation to sense him separate from her.

"Right beside you." He nodded to the bassinet attached to the side of her hospital bed. Still keeping a suspicious eye on her counterfeit husband, she leaned over the bassinet and gazed down at her child. She couldn't help the smile that bloomed across her face at the sight of him as she gently stroked the soft red fluff on top of his head. He was so beautiful, her son. Luke's son. She lifted him carefully out of the bassinet. It was terrifying, how tiny and fragile he was, how vulnerable. She held him close, overwhelmed by the unfamiliar rush of love she felt for this tiny being.

But she hadn't forgotten that they weren't alone, and she glanced up to see her guest watching her, a calculating look on his face. She scowled back. Mara hadn't recognized him last night, but she did now. She’d spent days pouring over his file. His assassination had been her very last mission for the Emperor, the only mission she’d never completed. _Myrkr._

"Your fake IDs are very good,” Talon Karrde said. "I assume that Celina Marniss isn't your given name. You wouldn't mind telling me who you really are?" Mara only glared. That someone with a fake ID was using a fake name was an easy guess, but she wasn’t planning on offering him any more information.

"Ah, no, then." He seemed unfazed her lack of response, his lip twitching as he met her hostile stare. "I took care of your little speeder incident. I had my slicer wipe the security files, but not before I took a look at them myself. I'm impressed. I’m always on the lookout for new talent, and I could use a woman with your _abilities_ in my organization." 

Mara stared at him. She was now sure that he’d overheard her attempt to muddle the nurse’s mind with the Force. It had been stupid of her to try that trick in a public space. And now he wanted to exploit her _abilities._

"No." Whatever he thought he had on her, whatever she might owe him for his chivalrous turn the night before, she couldn't accept his offer.

"I could offer you and your son protection. New identities, if you need them."

Oh, it was _tempting._

Mara had been forced to ditch her easily traceable Alliance Z-95, and now all she had were a handful of credits and the clothes on her back, barely enough to make it off-planet. And Ben would need things: clothing, and diapers and... whatever else an infant needed. From studying his file she figured that Karrde, known for his reliability in the violent and unpredictable world of the Fringe, would honor his promises, but she also knew better than anyone that Palpatine had his eye on the smuggler, and if she took a position in Karrde's syndicate she'd be discovered.

"I told you, no." 

"What do you plan to do instead? Waitress? Mechanic? Come-up flector for a swoop gang? That world is no place to bring up a child."

"I'll manage," Mara said. "Plenty of people do. It's not like a smuggling operation is an ideal place for children either."

Karrde shrugged. "Arrangements could be made. I take care of my people." He tilted his head to the side, considering her. "Another offer then: work for me on a freelance basis. I hire you for the occasional job that suits your—skillset—and I need to be taken care of quietly. Very quietly. No one would need to know except us." It sounded like he already had a job in mind, which made Mara even more wary.

She considered as she laid her baby back in his bassinet, fidgeting with the blankets, her fingers brushing across his perfect fingers and toes. She had a son to take care of now, and the money from an occasional job for Karrde would make a great deal of difference in their survival. 

"I need to stay on the move,” she said finally.

"I'll work out a way to contact you. Once you’ve recovered." 

"Fine."

He smiled, pleased.

She turned back to her son, not willing to show her new benefactor any sign of gratitude that might encourage him to take advantage of her. The baby yawned and stirred, blinking bright blue eyes up at her. Mara's heart gave a little jolt, and she felt the smile creep back onto her face again.

She glanced up at Karrde. His gaze was still calculating, but his question was gentle. "What will you call him?"

Mara smiled down at her baby boy. "Ben. For his father." 

Luke would have liked that if he had been here; it felt like something he would have wanted, honoring the Jedi who had mentored him and rescued him from Tatooine.

"A good name," Karrde said. 

She was so glad she hadn't killed him on Myrkr.

 

\- -

 

_Bimmisaari_

 

Mara prodded at the soggy, half-burned lump at the bottom of the pan. "Oh, Ben,” she sighed. "Your mom's burned dinner again."

She turned to look at the toddler playing happily on the floor of their dingy apartment, bashing together a pair of brightly colored blocks. She couldn't help but smile as he looked up at the sound of her voice and beamed at her. He had her hair, a thick mop of bright red-gold, and his father's sky-blue eyes. 

"I had a personal cook once,” Mara mused aloud as she began to scrape the lump onto a plate. She liked talking to Ben, even if he couldn't understand her yet, and it seemed to bother him when she fell silent for too long. "And there was always a cafeteria on whatever Alliance base we were posted at, so I never need to learn. Your father cooked for me once or twice." 

She smiled sadly at Ben, and his face crumpled in worry as he sensed her grief, even if he was far too young to understand the source. The bond she had with Ben wasn't the same as her connection to his father, but it helped to fill that aching emptiness that Luke had left. She immediately reached out through their Force-enhanced connection to reassure Ben, and then joined him on the floor. He babbled earnestly, handing her an orange block. As she helped him build a tower out of his blocks, she halfheartedly ate the lump encrusted on the bottom of the pan. Even Yoda had been a better cook than she was, though the stews he had served her through her pregnancy had become increasingly bizarre the further along she got.

Before Luke and Yoda and the Rebellion, before the Empire and the years of cooks and nannies and assistants, she had just been a child with parents who loved her, as she loved Ben. She had very few memories from that time, just infuriatingly vague glimpses that she wasn't even sure were events she truly remembered. She couldn't even remember her parents' names. It had never bothered her before, but now she wondered what she would say to Ben when he asked about her childhood. 

If Vader didn't find them before then. 

She wondered where Leia was, what Han and Chewie were up to. She missed Luke with a bone-deep intensity, but she also felt the loss of her Alliance family—and they had been a family, though she hadn't recognized it at the time—and she knew she might never see them again.

Like a sudden electric shock, Mara's danger sense came to life.

She bolted to her feet, snatching up Ben. Stretching out through the Force, could sense four bounty hunters in the building, and they weren't human. Moving quickly and quietly, she retrieved the blaster strapped to the underside of the table and ducked into the bedroom. Locking Ben in the only closet in the room, she began to pry up the wall panel that hid her lightsaber, her mind half occupied with soothing Ben though the Force as he fussed a little, startled by the commotion and her sudden spike of fear. 

Whoever Vader had sent made quick work of the front door, and she could hear them moving around the apartment; it didn't take long, as there wasn't much apartment to search. She’d barely taken hold of the saber when they broke down the door to the bedroom, the cheap paneling splintering under their blows. She stunned the first two through the entryway with her blaster, but the second two managed to slip through with startling speed and knock the weapon out of her hand. They were small, grey-skinned, and unbelievably fast. Noghri Death Commandos, Mara realized as she struck out toward her attackers. 

She kicked out and managed to knock back the closest Noghri, which gave the second commando the chance to get in close, and she had to duck backwards to avoid the slash of his knife. She used the handle of her saber like a club, slamming down on his knife hand. The Noghri grunted as the knife fell, but in a shockingly swift move, caught her arm and pulled her forward, yanking her off her feet and to the ground, where he pinned her to the floor.

Before she could attempt to throw him off, she heard a cry. _Ben._ She jerked her head around to see the other Noghri emerging from the closet with Ben in his arms. She went limp and reassessed her situation. With the Force and her lightsaber, she could end this fight, but she didn't want to risk any harm to Ben. She could use the Force to yank Ben from the Noghri, and then—

The Noghri holding Ben spoke urgently to the Noghri pinning her to the floor in their native tongue, a language so obscure Mara couldn't even begin to decipher it, though she could feel shock radiating from both of them. He released her but positioned himself between her and the Noghri holding Ben. She shifted into a crouch, ready to spring into action the moment an opportunity presented itself, mentally soothing Ben until he calmed in the Noghri's arms.

The Noghri who had pinned her spoke first. "Your child carries the bloodline of our Lord Vader. What is the meaning of this?"

 _Of course._ Their sense of smell was legendary in certain Imperial circles; it was rumored they could smell lies. She frantically searched her memory for anything she had read or been told about the Noghri. They were matriarchal, weren't they?

"I am Mara of the clan—" She hesitated. "The head mother of the clan Skywalker. Before he was Lord Vader, your lord was Anakin clan Skywalker. His son was Luke clan Skywalker, and that is his grandson, Ben clan Skywalker." Family ties were of utmost importance to the Noghri, whose strict codes of honor and obligation had bound the entire race into Vader’s service.

"Maitrakh Mara clan Skywalker, I am Khabarakh clan Kihm'bar," the Noghri said with a slight bow of his head. "Why would Lord Vader send us to kill the maitrakh of the clan Skywalker?" He seemed troubled. "Is there a blood feud in your clan?"

 _"Yes,”_ she said. _'Blood feud'_ would be about right. The other Noghri made a hissing sound, and said something to his companion in their language. He didn't sound very happy either.

"It would be a grave dishonor to get involved in another clan's blood feud." The Noghri regarded her, his eyes serious and conflicted. "And we would never harm the secondson of Vader. But we cannot disregard Lord Vader's orders."

"Vader's afraid that we might be a threat to the Emperor, that's why he murdered his son. He placed his loyalty to his master over his loyalty to his clan." The Noghri looked shocked. One of them muttered something under their breath. "Ben's father died at Vader's hand."

"How can we know this isn't a lie?" The Noghri holding Ben hissed.

"You can check Luke Skywalker's file in the Imperial records on Coruscant.” Her own files might tell a different story, but Mara was confident that the Noghri wouldn’t have the access codes to dig into her past. “And you already know that Ben is Vader's grandson."

The Noghri nodded. At least on that count, they were certain.

"He's only a child, and neither of us is a threat to the Emperor or your Lord Vader. I know it's not fair to ask you to divide your loyalties, but as Maitrakh of the Skywalker clan, I ask you to do the honorable thing and to step away from this blood feud. Let us go. Please."

The Noghri conversed softly in their own tongue. Mara waited, trying to gauge the course of their debate via impressions of their emotions, rather than the language. They came to a conclusion, and Khabarakh, who seemed to have taken upon himself to be their spokesman, addressed her.

"We have decided to let you and your son go. We will tell Lord Vader that we failed this mission and did not recover you. But we must consult the leaders of our clans before we decide if future missions will keep your secret. That is not my decision to make."

"I can offer the clans something in return if that will help your case,” Mara said. She’d use any scrap of information she knew to protect Ben. The Noghri looked intrigued, so she continued: "The next time you're in the Imperial Center, look up the file KHOLM-96799. It isn't listed, so you have to use the exact record number, do you understand? There's information in that file your people should know, but you'll have to decide what to do about it." 

Khabarakh nodded solemnly. 

The file outlined exactly how the Emperor had worked to keep the Noghri indebted indefinitely to Vader, information that could potentially turn the Noghri against the Empire, if they choose to believe her. It could free their people from the debt they felt they owed to Vader, and if there was anything Mara could do to undermine Vader, she'd do it. They were as much under Vader’s spell as she’d been under the Emperor’s.

"Thank you, Khabarakh clan Kihm'bar,” Mara said. “The Skywalker clan is in debt to you."

They didn’t part as allies, exactly, but they had an understanding. Enough of an understanding that Mara hoped that she wouldn’t have to face Khabarakh or his people again. Vader himself was enemy enough. 

 

\- -

 

_Omman Minor_

 

"Mom, this tastes like _pwo,"_ Ben said as he poked at his dinner sullenly.

Mara still hadn't picked up much of a knack for cooking over the years. In her defense, had been a long day and she hadn't had time to pick up anything fresh at the market, so she’d scraped something together from whatever was left in their nearly bare cabinets. That something, a wet lump of vegtables and grains in a grey sauce was edible but not appetizing.

"Ben, we don't have anything else. You have to eat it." She took a bite. It really was terrible.

"No, I don't." 

They glared at each other across the table.

Ben let out a string of extremely filthy Huttese with the reckless relish of a child fully aware that he was baiting his mother.

Luke had taught Mara some Huttese, and she had taught Ben enough to get by when they were traveling through Hutt space, but she'd never taught him _that_ expression. It was a turn of phrase that would have made a spacer blush. For a moment, Mara wasn't sure whether to laugh or yell. Instead, she slammed her hand down on the table, hard, rattling every item on the surface. Ben jumped, his eyes going wide. 

"Ben Skywalker, _what did you just say?"_

"I'm sorry!" he cried. 

"Leave the table." 

He jumped out of his chair and ran off and Mara buried her face in her hands, hot tears pricking at the corners of her eyes. This was harder than she had expected; hard in ways that constantly surprised her. It seemed like yesterday he was teething and wouldn't _stop crying,_ and she honestly wanted to throttle her own child. _Now_ he was insulting her in Huttese. Every day she faced problems that she couldn't just _shoot them_  to make them go away. Every night she felt like a citzi beetle that had been tossed onto its back, its legs scabbling helplessly in the air. 

And there were times when Ben's bright presence in the Force still wasn't enough to fill the hollow parts of her mind left by Luke's absence.

She was just so tired.

She was working long hours at a factory that didn't ask its employees too many questions while Ben attended a local school with the other workers' children. The money was just enough to get by, but it wouldn't be enough to get off the planet, and they would need to relocate soon. She would have to contact Karrde and ask for an assignment to make up the difference. She didn't like to rely on him too often, and one of his jobs would mean that she'd have to find a safe house for Ben and a contingency plan in case she didn't come back—which was always likely on one of Karrde's missions. 

A memory rose to the surface: a not particularly successful mission for the Alliance just before Hoth. They were all grubby, tired and worn out, waiting anxiously at the safehouse for everyone to check in. Luke was an hour late to the rendezvous and Mara was busy wearing a hole in the floor with her pacing when he finally arrived, none the worse for wear, explaining in the face of her temper that everything had been perfectly fine, he'd just made a detour to pick something up. He handed her a small package, an insufferably smug expression on his face. She still ached when she remembered his smile at the gasp she made when she opened the package.

"Risshi biscuits!" 

"Risshi cakes," Luke said.

"Risshi _biscuits,"_ Mara countered in a perfectly enunciated Coruscanti accent.

"Risshi _cakes,"_ Luke insisted with a grin. _Force, she missed his smile._

Mara rolled her eyes, stuffing the cake into her mouth. He laughed and kissed the sugar off her lips.

What she wouldn't give for a risshi cake now.

She felt a small hand tug on her sleeve.

"Mommy, I'm sorry," Ben said.

"I know, Ben," Mara sighed. 

"Can we dance?" It was a conciliatory gesture, but Mara accepted it.

She loved teaching Ben to dance. They spent so much of their time training; as small as he was, there was so much to teach him and no time to waste. He had to learn to defend himself, he had to learn the ways of the Force like his parents, and he had to learn how to survive on every one of the dozens of planets they had lived on. But when Mara led him through the steps of a dance, she wasn't thinking about how this particular skill might mean the difference between life and death. She could simply teach him something she loved.

"All right. First steps of the Siv Tau, please."

Ben rushed to the center of the room and took the correct position for the dance and Mara rose to join him. Vader was out there, still searching for them, but here, in this moment, dancing with her son, Mara was happy.

\- -

 

_Pirik_

 

Mara woke, sitting up with a gasp, disoriented and struggling to identify what had woken her. The blaster she kept under the bed was in her hand before she had time to think; before she realized what had pulled her out of sleep. 

 _A disturbance in the Force._ It felt like a great wave of sadness washing over her, and she knew.

Yoda was gone.

She stored the blaster and made sure she was shielding Ben from her grief, as he slept in his cot on the other side of the room, before she padded over to the window. On the other side of the transparisteel the city shimmered restlessly in the dark. They had been living in a small apartment high up in a squalid high-rise for three months now, in between jobs for Karrde and whatever menial work Mara could find to support them in the meantime.

It had been nearly five years since she'd left Dagobah. She knew that Yoda's health was failing and that he'd never fully recovered from the shock of Luke's death. He'd been so frail when she left, but she still hadn't imagined he'd ever  _die_. She hoped that Kenobi's spirit had been with him in the end, to guide him into the embrace of the living Force. It felt like he'd given up on her, just like—like Luke had given up and taken the fall. It wasn't a fair comparison, she knew, but she couldn’t help feeling that she'd been abandoned again. 

And she knew it was her fault. Yoda had sent messages, begging her to find Leia and return, and she'd ignored them. She still didn't dare approach the Alliance, not even to reassure Leia that she was alive. She knew that if she rejoined the Alliance that Vader would find her there, and she had, selfishly, wanted to keep Ben to herself, out of the conflict and away from the machinations of Jedi and Sith. Let the Alliance assume that she’d been killed or returned to the Empire. 

She had chosen the dangerous life of a fugitive instead, and now her reasons for staying away from Yoda seemed petty and shortsighted. When she didn't return, what did he have left to live for? Now she would never be able to make it up to him. 

She and Ben were alone.

"Mom?" a small voice asked. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," she said, turning from the window. "Go back to sleep."

He gave her a sleepy frown and rubbed his eyes, confused at the obvious lie.

"I'll tell you a story," she offered.

He considered for a moment. "Okay," he said. 

Mara was able to manage a small smile as she led him back to bed. He climbed into the cot and she tucked the blanket around him. _Safe._ For the time being, he was safe. This precarious, meager life on the Fringe had all been for Ben's survival. Nothing was more important than that. 

"Tell me the story about the time Aunt Leia stole Dad’s X-wing and nearly crashed it.”

“Your Aunt Leia probably wouldn’t describe it like that.”

But it was a funny story, and enough to distract them both for the night.

 

\- -

 

_Chardaan_

 

"It's a bit of a junker, but the engine's still good,” Mirax said. “If you don’t push her too hard, she should last you a few decades.”

“Hmm,” Mara said, playing the role of an undecided customer as she made one last circuit around the ship. It small, and wasn't a particularly attractive, but she wasn't in the market for something flashy. 

Their identities had been blown on Murkhana and they'd been forced to flee the planet, catching rides along Shipwright's Trace until they were far enough into the Inner Rim to have lost their pursuers. Public transports had grown too dangerous and there were always risks involved in hiring smugglers to take them from planet to planet. After a string of risky jobs for Karrde, she'd finally saved enough credits to purchase her own ship. Trader and smuggler Mirax Terrik Horn was Fringe enough not to demand all the proper registration forms or look too closely into their false IDs, but honest enough not to lay any traps for her customers. 

“I’ll throw in a free refuel,” Mirax offered. "Honestly, I just want to get her out of my fleet. She's not fast enough to make the runs I need ships for, but that shouldn't be a problem if you're not dodging Imperial patrols." 

With any luck, they wouldn't have to. Mara gave the ship one last appraising look. It _was_ a piece of junk, but it was within her price range and Mirax was right, it was solid enough for her purposes. “I’ll take it.” 

"Wonderful," Mirax said, with a smile that almost seemed genuine. 

Mara only knew Mirax by reputation. She reminded Mara of a pretty, bright-eyed lesynn bird, with a smile that was open and easy. She wore her hair in a sleek black bob and her jacket was worn but well made, and Mara admired it, her own long coat beyond shabby these days. 

Mirax passed her a datapad and Mara signed the relevant sections and authorized the transfer of funds to Mirax’s account before passing back the pad. Mirax slipped a strand of black hair behind her ear as she reviewed the credit record and Mara waited for her approval of the transaction. She made a small sound of surprise as she gazed down at the datapad, her finger sliding down the screen.

"Say hello to Karrde for me," she said, smiling. 

Mara froze, and then shifted her stance so that she could easily access the blaster and lightsaber hidden under her coat. Mirax glanced up, noticing the change in her body language. "Is something wrong?" she said, her eyes flicking past Mara as she scanned the surrounding area for danger.

"How did you know I worked for Karrde?" Mara said tightly.

Mirax's attention returned to her. "There's a tag on your credit record. It's a way for his operatives to identify each other, a way of saying ‘hey, don't stiff me, we're on the same team.’ Karrde has the most ingenious slicer; it just reads a junk code unless you know what to look for. I thought you knew." Mirax looked concerned now. "Was I not supposed to say anything?"

Mara didn't sense any deception from her. "No, it's fine." Karrde's network was extensive, and the fact that she had received the credits from him wouldn't give Mirax enough information to trace them. Mara knew Karrde well enough now to know that he wouldn't betray her. 

"I don't work for Karrde myself, but he's known my father forever, and he's done us a few good turns now and then. He's a good man. Don't tell my father I said that." Mirax gave her a conspiratorial wink. "Anyway, your payment checks out. She's all yours!"

While doing business with Mirax, Mara had kept one eye on Ben, who was chatting animatedly to an astromech droid nearby while they had been negotiating her purchase. Mara gave him a nudge through the Force and he came skipping back to her side and leaning up against her as she tousled his hair. He pointed excitedly up at Mirax’s ship, parked not far off. "That's the _Pulsar Skate!"_ he said, and rattled off a series of stats that Mara didn’t pay much attention to. 

“He’s heard stories,” Mara said. He’d been spending too much time around spacers, that was obvious. 

"Would you like a tour?" Mirax asked Ben. 

"Yeah!"

"If your mom says it's okay."

Mara looked at Mirax in surprise. Not many smugglers let strangers into their ships, and for good reason, and Mirax had no reason to trust them, even if she did hold Karrde in high regard. Mirax smiled and lifted a shoulder in a half shrug. "I was a spaceport kid too."

“Okay,” she told Ben. “Don’t take long.”

She opted to remain at the foot of the _Pulsar Skate's_ boarding ramp instead of taking the tour as well. Mara still didn’t sense any deception from Mirax, but kindness could also be a trap. She’d felt a tingle of foreboding, though it didn’t come from the direction of the _Pulsar Skate._ Something wasn’t right, and she wanted to be out in the open as she figured it out. She looked slowly around the spaceport, a bored, unconcerned expression plastered on her face. _There._ Taking far too much interest in her new purchase was a shabby looking human and a droid.

The droid swiveled its boxy grey head in her direction and caught her looking. _Blast._ She let her gaze sweep on, as if she’d barely registered his presence, and after waiting a few more beats, her gaze fixed in the opposite direction, she casually strolled onto the _Pulsar Skate,_ calling out for Ben.

“What is it, Mom?” He poked his head out of the cockpit. He had a grease smudge on his cheek and Mara hoped the Mirax hadn't let him get into anything he shouldn't have been playing with. 

“We’re being followed.”

“Bounty hunters?" Mirax said. "Or—?”

At Mara’s terse nod, Mirax said, “Come with me.” 

She led Mara through the ship to a small hatch that opened to the outside and gave them a direct line of sight onto the floor of the spaceport below. Mara could see the droid at the side of her ship, possibly installing a tracking device of some kind, the human bounty hunter standing guard a few paces away. If they’d just watched her buy the junker from Mirax, then they’d definitely seen her with Ben. Kriffing bounty hunters. 

“Rifle?” Mirax asked. 

When Mara looked up, Mirax passed her a long-range blaster rifle. 

“What’s going on, Mom?” Ben, ever curious, had followed them into the cabin.

“Stay back, Ben,” Mara said, leveling the rifle. He knew from her tone of voice to hold back and keep quiet.

Mara took aim at the droid first. Her shot shattered the top half of the droid’s body, halting whatever it was it had been doing to her ship and destroying any recording of her and Ben it might have in its memory. The human bolted, as expected. Mara was an excellent shot, but a moving target was always a challenge to hit. She caught him on the shoulder, knocking him over, but he got back up again and kept running, turning a corner and vanishing.

“Kriff,” Mara gritted out.

 _“Mom,”_ Ben said reproachfully.

“I expect you’ll need to leave quickly,” Mirax said, her tone a bit dry. “Go get her prepped and I’ll comm ahead and get you clearance to leave. I know the port officers, they’ll let your authorization slide if I ask nicely.”

“Thank you, Mirax.” It was an odd feeling to have someone who had her back. Mara hadn’t felt that often since she’d left the Alliance.

“No problem. I’m happy to give one of Karrde’s people a hand.”

Meaning: _let him know so I can collect the favor_. 

“Now get out of here,” Mirax said, making a shooing motion with her hands. She smiled, and Mara wondered if she'd misjudged her.

Mara made sure that the droid had been completely obliterated before she boarded her new purchase, a few more shots loaded into the droid’s smoking remains. There wasn’t any more she could do about the bounty hunter who’d escaped except hope that he never reported back to Vader.

 

\- -

 

_Unnamed planet_

 

Mara hauled the last blaster-burned mynock corpse over to the pile of leathery bodies beside the wreck of her ship, tossing it on top with a grunt. She stripped off her heavy work gloves and tucked them in her belt as she considered the pile, Ben standing beside her.

They'd been on their way out of the Quelii sector when the ship's alarms had started ringing. Mara had no choice but to bring them out of hyperspace and point them toward the nearest planet with breathable air, a speck of a planet that didn't even have a name or designation. It had taken all her skill as a pilot to land their junker of a ship, as the alarms screamed out various system failures. She'd lost control, at the very end, and plowed the ship into the earth, rendering it flightless for the time being. 

It hadn't taken her long to figure out what had caused their crash landing. A nest of Mynocks, picked up at their last port of call, had annihilated the ship's systems and rendered it beyond any repairs that she could manage on her own without access to tools or parts, and she had neither, stranded on an uninhabited planet in the middle of nowhere. 

She felt a trickle of foreboding shiver down her spine, not strong enough to indicate immediate trouble, but a sense that it might be coming in the future. It could mean that they’d be trapped on the planet, without means to repairs their ship, for a while. Or it could mean—something worse was coming. She looked up at the sky, beginning to turn the deep blue of late afternoon. It was empty. 

Ben spoke up as he surveyed the pile. "I think we should eat them, Mom." 

Mara made a face. He was right. Their food supplies wouldn’t last them until help arrived, and they needed the meat, which, if they smoked it, would last weeks. Still. _Mynocks._

"Your cooking can't possibly make them worse, anyway," he said, not even bothering to hide a sly smile. 

"Ben!"

They laughed. 

"You're right, we'll need the meat. Who knows how long we'll be stuck on this planet." Mara sighed. "I guess today's lesson is how to skin a mynock."

"Like when you taught me how to skin a furrol," Ben said. Ben’s education had been unusual, to say the least.

"Well, the concept's the same," Mara conceded. When she was his age, growing up in the Imperial Palace, she never had an inkling that one day she'd been stripping mynocks in order to survive.

"I'll get the knives!" Ben said with a glee that made Mara roll her eyes. She was glad they had a food source since it would probably be awhile until anyone picked up her emergency beacon and freed them from this barren rock.

Still. _Mynocks._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaand now we've come full circle. Next, the big Mara vs Vader vs the Emperor showdown! 
> 
> I haven't watched Rebels or The Clone Wars, but I understand that in new cannon, the Emperor would have sent Inquisitors after Mara. This story is based on Legends, so it's the Noghri who find her instead.
> 
> Thanks, as always, to frangipani for beta and support.


	6. Chapter Four

_Vespaxan_

The Emperor was waiting for them at Vespaxan.

The galaxy hadn’t been the same since the Alliance had devastated the Imperial fleet at the Battle of Endor and permanently crippled the Death Star in a fierce fight above the obscure forest moon. The Emperor and Vader had barely escaped the conflagration. Though they still held the galaxy in their grip, systems were gradually sliding out of their control as the Alliance gathered strength and influence. Mara heard that they were calling themselves the New Republic now that they’d won enough territory to consolidate their power. In response, the Emperor had been massing his forces at Vespaxan.

Vespaxan had long been the site of an Imperial space station, but after Endor it had taken on new significance. The center of the station had been built from the shattered half-sphere of the Endor Death Star, newly constructed sections reaching out from the base like long spindly spider legs, Star Destroyers swarming around the station as it hovered in space like a malignant arachnid. It didn’t have the sleek lines that Palpatine loved, but the structure had an unsettling malevolence that that was just as effective. It was rumored that Palpatine had become obsessed with stomping out the Alliance and spent more and more time at Vespaxan commanding his fleet, leaving the running of the Imperial Capital to his viziers and the Grand Moffs.

As the shuttle landed on Vespaxan's flight deck, Vader’s soldiers hauled her and Ben out of the shuttle’s cell and put her in cuffs. They didn’t appear to consider Ben enough of a threat to restrain him and let him walk along beside her, his hand clinging to her shackled arm. Mara gave Vader a long look, as he stood to the side, silently watching as his men restrained her. They both knew that she could use the Force to free herself, but neither of them said anything about it. 

This should have been his moment of triumph, but Mara didn’t sense even a flicker of satisfaction from Vader. Ever since their conversation aboard the shuttle, Mara could sense, underneath the churning rage the always fueled him, a deep well of grief that mirrored her own, Luke's absence a hollow space that echoed through them both. They both knew that it should have been Luke who faced Palpatine, not the Emperor’s damaged former servant and a child. 

Luke's death haunted Vader too, though he still bent to the will of the man who wanted to turn his son and grandson to the dark side. Rage, fear, and indecision poured off of the Sith Lord in an almost suffocating swirl. Her head was beginning to pound with the effort of maintaining a psychic shield to protect Ben from the seething mass of emotions Vader was projecting. It made her teeth ache. 

But even that paled in comparison to her first sense of the Emperor’s presence. The feeling of festering evil saturated the entire station, tendrils of the dark side pressing up against her shields. She staggered as she stepped off the shuttle, bending over and struggling to keep from dry heaving. Ben gripped her arm, his eyes wide, mouth in an “o” of shock.

She’d grown up in the Emperor’s presence, but it had been years since she’d had to deal with the close influence of the dark side. He was like a cancer eating away at the galaxy, polluting it with the dark side, and sudden re-exposure to its oppressive power was a shock to her system. It was hard to think; to focus on anything except his overpowering presence. she was shaking, shuddering, as she tried to keep her stomach from trying to heave itself out of her mouth. Vader stood silently until she pulled herself together, a tower of icy indifference to her reaction.

"Mom, are you okay?" Ben tugged at her arm. 

"I just need a minute, Ben," she gasped.

She took a few deep breaths, wrapping the Force around her, insulating herself as much as she could manage, before she was able to straighten. The white armored guard stood nearby, waiting for Vader's signal. 

“Vader,” she said softly, shifting closer to him in an attempt to appeal to him one last time as the full horror of the situation crashed down on her. “You’ll never be able to defeat him. He’ll take Ben away and twist him to his own design. There’ll be nothing left of him when the Emperor’s through with him.”

She knew he regretted Luke’s death, and hoped, _hoped,_ it was enough to convince him not to hand Ben over to the Emperor. She didn’t have any illusions the Sith would lift a finger for her.

“His fate is no longer your concern,” he said.

“He’s all that’s left of your son. Please, for Luke’s sake, if not for mine—” 

With an abrupt jerk of his arm, he signaled to the troopers, who yanked her away and marched her through the docking bay, Ben at her side. They continued on, deep into the belly of the station. Ben was quiet, but peered around at everything with interest. He’d never been on a military base before couldn’t repress his own curiosity in spite of his fear. For Mara, it was all sickeningly familiar. The Imperial military, designed to Palpatine’s exact specifications, hadn’t changed much in the ten years since she’d deserted at Myrkr. The halls of the station passed in a gray and black blur, with flashes of white as stormtrooper units passed them by; memories invoked by the smell of the air and hum of the station threatened to overwhelm her. At the entrance to the throne room, Vader dismissed his troops and led them through the door himself, past the scarlet-robed Royal Guard that flanked the outer doorway.

Stepping into the Emperor’s throne room was like stepping back into her past. Even though Mara never set foot in this particular iteration, it was exactly as she recalled, the dramatically darkened hall and the steep flight of stairs bringing back a rush of nightmarish memories. Vader led them up the stairs to the high backed throne, set against a huge viewport looking out onto the glittering expanse of the galaxy.

And in that throne, his yellow eyes filled with malice, was the Emperor.

"So you return to me again, my traitorous child. As I always knew you would.” 

Mara struggled to speak through the fear clutching at her throat.

“I’m not your child,” she choked out, in a voice pathetically small. The urge to flee was overwhelming; her panic-filled brain yelling at her to snatch up Ben and _run,_ but the Emperor was using his power to fix her in place like a trapped insect.

Palpatine chuckled as if amused at her shaky display of defiance. “You were always _mine._ No matter where you fled, you were always destined to return to me.” He rose, pacing forward to peer at her from under his hood. "Though you eluded my grasp far longer than I imagined." She felt the cold prickle of terror as he eyed her.

"I had excellent teachers." She’d kept the waver out of her voice this time.

"Yes." Palpatine regarded her. "Your skills have greatly improved since you turned against me. Who trained you in the ways of the Jedi?"

"It doesn't matter. He's dead now."

“Yoda,” Palpatine said decisively. “Only he could have evaded me for so long. He and Kenobi and their feeble schemes!” His voice took on a mocking lilt. “Did they tell you were _special?_ That you could be the next hope of the Jedi? Or did they abandon you too, when they realized you for the selfish traitor you are? Did they abandon you like your lover did when he threw himself to his death?”

Mara flinched as though she’d been struck.

"You couldn’t even stop him from leaving you, could you?” Palpatine cackled. “What a failure you turned out to be!" He laughter rang through the throne room. "You were only good for one thing: you have brought me Skywalker's son at last." He finally turned toward Ben, a small figure bracketed by Mara and Vader, bending forward to look the boy in the eye.

Ben spat at the Emperor.

Mara choked back a hysterical laugh. She had never been more proud and more frightened for him.

"Insolent brat!" The Emperor’s hand twitched upwards as though he was about to strike out, and Mara went cold with the knowledge of what would come next.

With a blinding flash, the light of a proton torpedo blast lit up the view behind the Emperor’s throne. They all jerked around to stare. Although no sound could be heard through the transparisteel, the explosion flared brightly against the dark of space, illuminating the ships of the Alliance fleet, which had appeared out of hyperspace surrounding Vespaxan, X-Wing fighters already blasting away at the station. There were more Alliance ships than Mara had ever seen assembled, more than she had imagined they even had, though they were still stretched thin in comparison to Vespaxan’s fleet.

The chime of the comm installed the throne rang out. The Emperor hissed as he opened the comm line with the twitch of his wrist. “What is it, Admiral Piett?”

Piett. It took her a moment to place the name. He’d only been a lieutenant when she served the Empire.

“Apologies, Emperor. The Rebel fleet has commenced an attack on the base. Our ships are being sent to engage them. We will defeat them.”

“Do so. And don’t interrupt me again.” He cut the connection. “No matter.” The Emperor waved a hand, dismissing the battle that raged on behind him. “My forces will swat them away like the insignificant insects they are.”

Another explosion lit up the room. The Alliance was hitting hard and fast, crowding in close to the base. Mara had known many of the fighter pilots that made up the Alliance fleet, and she wondered who among them was still alive and fighting for the cause.

The Emperor turned back to her, a malicious smile on his face. “Now where was I?”

“My Master,” Vader said. "She still carries this.” He held out Mara’s lightsaber.

“Ah, a stolen toy.” Palpatine plucked it out of Vader’s hands and cradled it in his own.

The weapon heated in his hands, turning a molten red, and then crumbled to dust. Mara blanched as her lightsaber disintegrated before her, as he opened his hands and let the dust pour to the floor.

"That lightsaber was my gift to you. You threw away all my gifts to you, and now you will pay for that betrayal.”

Palpatine’s cold yellow eyes fixed on hers as reached out through the Force to press against her mind, and to her horror, Mara felt the old connection that tied her to him spring to life again. His raspy cackle filled the throne room. "Oh, you thought you would be able to keep me out, didn't you?”

He used the traces of the once-dead link to force his way into her mind, swarming into her thoughts. He was trying the fill the places in her head that had been hollow since Luke died. Mara gave out a choked cry as she felt him invade her mind. 

“Did you think a pathetic attempt to replace our connection with a bond to that Jedi boy would change that? Did you think he would protect you? But he left you all alone, didn’t he? Did you _feel_ his _death?”_

Mara fought back, her breath ragged and eyes swimming. She would _not_ let him back in. She reached into the Force to give her strength, drawing on her love of Luke and Ben to fortify her defenses. The dark side wasn’t stronger than she was, and she used the light to resist him, to protect her link to Ben from his invasion. The Emperor clung to the old pathways into her psyche, trying to bind her to him, and Mara struck back, forcing his retreat, driving him out. She sucked in a deep breath as her shields held up against his sheer power, the light of the Force holding him at bay.

She might not last the next hour, but he’d never corrupt her again. 

“You’ll never have me again.” She said, her voice clear and strong at last.

The Emperor gave a cry of frustration and flicked his hand, lightning flashing out and hitting Mara straight in the chest. It was a quick blast, meant to cause the maximum amount of pain with minimal damage. Palpatine meant to take his time with her. It knocked her back, and unable to catch her fall with her shackled hands, she landed hard, the back of her head meeting the floor with a crack. She lay gasping, shuddering in agony, sparks of dark energy still cracking across her skin. The Emperor laughed.

Ben was screaming for her, but Vader held him back, a tight hand gripping his shoulders. Palpatine snapped his fingers forward, sending another bolt into her, his face twisted into grim delight as she thrashed on the floor. He paused as he watched her convulse, feeding off her suffering. Through the haze of pain, she was aware that Ben had wrenched himself out of Vader’s grasp and threw himself in between her and the Emperor.

Palpatine merely seemed amused by Ben’s attempt to protect her. "I see that Skywalker's son is as foolish as he was.” He raised his hand again. “A little punishment will teach him discipline.” Ben flinched at the sparking power gathering there, but stubbornly stood his ground. The Emperor’s grin widened.

"No!" Mara rasped, trying and failing to lift herself from a shaking heap on the floor. “Ben, don’t—” She could barely move for the wracking pain, let alone defend her son. She’d failed Luke, and now she was going to fail Ben.

The bolt of blue energy he launched at Ben was no more than a slap compared to power he’d thrown at Mara, but it knocked the child over. Mara wanted to throw up at the sound of her son’s scream as the lightning burned into him. The Emperor crouched over both of them, laughing maniacally. Ben struggled back to his feet, sobbing, and stood once more in front of his mother. Frantic entreaties to spare Ben poured from her mouth, though Mara was barely even aware of what she was saying.

Abruptly, her view of the Emperor was blocked as the towering figure of Vader stepped forward, to stand in between her and Ben and his master. There was a long frozen moment, as Palpatine and Mara gaped at the Sith, an unfathomable barrier between them.

“You _dare_ defy me, my old _friend?_ ” Palpatine was incredulous.

"I cannot let you hurt the boy.”

Palpatine’s face twitched in shocked fury. “Then move aside so that I can finish _her._ ”

Vader considered for a long moment. Ben had darted to her side during the exchange, disengaging the locking system on the cuffs and frantically working her hands loose. She moaned as he freed her aching limbs and threw her shaking arms around him. 

“No. She is his mother. I will not let you take her from him.” There was a surge of inexplicable emotion from the Sith, as though this revelation had stirred something deep inside of him.

"Vader,” The Emperor hissed. “I had always foreseen your inevitable betrayal. But I did not expect you to throw yourself away for this insignificant wretch and her brat.”

“He is all that is left of my son," Vader said, echoing her earlier plea. “He is the last of the family that was stolen from me.” 

Palpatine gave him a sour glare. “So be it." Lightning leapt from his fingertips. Vader caught the bolt on his lightsaber, the snapping tendrils of energy wrapped around the glowing red blade, and the force of the attack pushed the Sith Lord back as he caught wave after wave of energy. A storm of lightning boiled around the two figures. Vader tried to press forward but the Emperor just redoubled his efforts, cackling madly as he drove Vader across the throne room. The bolts leapt up Vader’s arms, wrapping around his body. A burst of sparks erupted from the control plate on his chest, as the current of electricity destroyed the mechanics that kept him alive. With a cry, he fell back under the Emperor’s assault, the lightning crackling through him, his blade finally falling and his arm going limp as he collapsed.

The Emperor paced over to where Vader had fallen and stood over the smoking body of his servant. “You were a sentimental fool, my old friend. And disposable. With you and his mother dead, your grandson shall take your place as my creature.”

“Mom, Mom, get up!” Ben was tugging at her, sobbing. Mara rose shakily to her feet, her entire body crying out in protest as she stood, drawing on the Force to push the pain aside long enough to face the Emperor one last time. She swayed, but remained standing. Taking a deep breath, she reached out with the Force, calling Vader’s lightsaber from across the room. A lightsaber soared through the air and into her palm, and she looked down at the familiar lines of the silver cylinder in surprise. It wasn’t Vader’s lightsaber, it was Luke’s, she’d called _Luke’s_ saber to her from its place on Vader’s belt. The blue blade sprung to life, a beam of light that cut through the dark. 

Mara knew she wasn’t the skillful and powerful Jedi Yoda and Obi-Wan had dreamed would face the Emperor. She wasn’t a Jedi at all. She was just a mother who would do anything to protect her son. 

The Emperor, still gloating over Vader’s body, snapped his head around as she charged at him, power erupting from his hands once more. She ducked low, raising her blade to catch the lightning as it streaked toward her. The lightning met the lightsaber with a shriek, and the saber held off the force of the attack, but only barely.

Mara reached into the Force, yanking at the ghost of the connection that had once bound her to Palpatine. She struck at his mind, lashing out through the very link that he had tried to exploit earlier, and battered fiercely at his consciousness, using the remains of the bond that had once tied her to him. Palpatine gasped, staggering in surprise at her mental attack. His hands dropped, lightning sputtering out. It was all the opening Mara needed. She swept the blade forward and cut through her former master with a single blow.

Pure dark side energy erupted out of the Emperor as his body dropped to the ground. She felt herself lifted and yanked backward, landing next to Ben, as a Force shield bloomed around them, protecting her and Ben from the roaring blast of violent power. It wasn’t her doing. It was Vader, using the last of his life force to save them. Behind Vader’s Force-shield Mara curled around Ben until the blast energy of subsided.

Palpatine was dead.

She felt like she could breathe again.

“It’s okay. It’s over. It’s over.” She held Ben tightly, rocking back and forth. He was clinging to her, his face streaked with tears, but he was alive, they were both alive, and they were _free._

When Mara felt like she could stand again, she rose and crossed the room to where Vader struggled to hold onto life as the control panel on his chest sparked and failed. He looked smaller, lying there on the steel floor, his cape pooling beneath his body. 

"I did. What I need to do. For my family." He was barely holding on, but he sensed her presence. "Mara Jade," he gasped. "May I see my grandson. One last time?"

"I don't know if you deserve it," Mara said. 

The Sith Lord was fading fast. "I do not," his breath wheezed through the failing life support. "Please."

She recalled the moment, not long ago, when she had begged him to spare Ben and he’d refused, and considered refusing his dying request. She didn't know who Vader had been before had become the Emperor's pet monster, a man willing to gamble the lives of his own son and grandson against the dark side. She wasn’t sure she cared.

But that man had also stood between them and the Emperor and had given his life to save them. Mara wouldn’t have been able to kill the Emperor without him, and Ben would have been lost. He was dying, and this would be the last chance Ben would have to speak with his grandfather.

"Ben?" Mara called. Ben came to her side and looked down at the fallen giant. "This is your grandfather."

"I want to tell you," Vader gasped. "I'm sorry. For your. Father. Don't let it lead you. To the Dark Side." 

Ben looked at Mara, his eyes wide. She didn’t think he really understood what was happening in that moment, but one day he’d comprehend what his grandfather had done for him. He looked down at Vader again, into the eyes of that black mask. "Yes, grandfather."

"Forgive me, Mara," Vader said. "Take care. Of my grandson."

In the throne room at Vespaxan, the last of the Sith was dead.


	7. Chapter Five

_Vespaxan_

They had to get out of Vespaxan.

No one on the station knew yet that their lord and master was dead, and Mara meant to leave Vespaxan before anyone caught on. Turning away from Vader’s body and the blackened scar in the floor that was once the Emperor, she took Ben by the hand and fled down the steps of the throne room. Her next move would take a certain amount of skill and nerve, but she didn’t have any other options. She took a deep breath, drawing on her last reserves of energy, and opened the door.

Outside the throne room the Emperor’s Royal Guard lined the corridor, waiting patiently for their master to recall them. “The Emperor commands that you escort us to a shuttle in the docking bay number five,” Mara said in the cold voice of the Emperor’s Hand, throwing every bit of Force-enhanced influence into her order. If the Guards wondered what was going on they gave no sign.

Two of the Guards stepped forward and flanked Mara and Ben, who kept her head high and pace steady as though she and Ben were visiting dignitaries rather than the prisoners they had been. She used the Force to encourage anyone within range to smother their interest in this bedraggled woman and her son, and go about their business as if prisoners usually walked out of a private audience with the Emperor and Vader alive.

Vespaxan was in a state of controlled chaos as soldiers rushed to battle stations, taking little notice of their odd procession. Mara sensed the battle had turned, and while she hoped it was in the Alliance’s favor, she’d take any outcome that ended in her and Ben escaping alive. No one was paying much attention in docking bay five as the Royal Guard led Mara and Ben to a line of Lambda shuttles in docking bay five. Mara dismissed the guards and broke into one of the ships and powered it up. She ignored the squawk of the comm as the docking bay officers finally realized that an unauthorized shuttle was leaving the bay and drove the shuttle toward the exit as quickly as the engines would allow.

They flew out of the station and into a war zone. X-Wings and TIE fighters streaked by, cannons blazing; explosions lighting up the dark of space and rattling the small shuttle. Mara couldn't tell who was winning the battle, but it didn't matter. The Emperor was dead, Vader was dead. The Empire had lost, even if only she knew it yet.

She still had to cross Alliance lines in the midst of a heated battle, in a shuttle made for transport, not for combat, and she wouldn’t stand a chance against a fighter from either side. Her Alliance codes were over seven years out of date, but if she was lucky, someone with half a brain would notice them before they shot her out of the sky. One of the lead X-Wing fighters peeled away from a dogfight and swooped into range. The shuttle’s comm crackled. "Imperial shuttle, identify yourself and explain why you're broadcasting an Alliance signal."

Mara knew that voice. "Wedge! It's Mara!"

Wedge's voice, tinny and incredulous, replied, _"Mara?"_

"Wedge, please don't shoot us down. I need to speak to Leia. Please.”

There was a pause, as Wedge confirmed with his superiors on the other channel. Mara squeezed Ben's hand.

"Imperial shuttle, follow my course to _Home One."_

Mara let out a breath. "Thank you, Wedge." _Home One_ was coordinating the battle from well behind the safety of the Alliance fleet. Mara felt a surge of relief as she followed her escort into the ship’s docking bay.

As glad as she was to fall into the hands of the Alliance, Mara wasn’t entirely sure what sort of reception to expect and she wouldn’t have been surprised if they assumed she was a spy and shot her on the spot. Even if they didn’t assume she was a spy, she was a defector, and her loyalty would be called into question, and even if Leia was on board, there was no reason her old friend would even trust her again. She’d abandoned them all without a word, and they had every reason to suspect it was to return to her old loyalties.

“Are we safe, Mom?” Ben’s voice broke through her thoughts.

“I don’t know, Ben.”

She took his hand and they headed slowly to the ship’s exit. Leia stood waiting at the bottom of the ramp, the imposing figure of Chewbacca behind her. She was heavily pregnant. 

An immense sense of relief filled Mara at the sight of her sister in arms. Relief, and trepidation. She still wasn’t sure Leia would welcome her back. "Leia," was all she managed to say as she stepped off of the ship.

"Mara." Leia stared at her for a long moment, as though she couldn’t quite believe her eyes, then she took two quick steps forward and embraced Mara. "Oh, Mara. What happened to you?"

"He died, Leia. On Bespin."

"I know," Leia said. "I've always known. I'm so sorry, Mara. I can’t imagine what that must have been like for you. But where have you been? How did end up _here?”_

It was such a long story and Mara was exhausted; she just shook her head. "Why are _you_ here?" She asked. "How did you know to come to Vespaxan?"

"We were already preparing for a major offensive, and then I..." Leia faltered, looking uneasy. "I heard your voice screaming for help. In my _head._ And I knew we had to move on Vespaxan immediately. I don't know how I knew. I just _knew."_

It took Mara a minute to process that information through the sheer exhaustion she was fighting, and then she almost laughed. She’d been barely aware that she’d used the Force to call for help when Vader had captured them, and Leia had heard her and sent _an entire army._ To rescue _her._

There was something else she needed to tell Leia before exhaustion claimed her, something more important: "Vader's dead. The Emperor's dead."

"What?" Leia gasped, gripping Mara's arms tightly.

"I killed him." Mara was so tired. Every part of her ached.

"You _what?_ "

They were safe now. Mara swayed in Leia’s grip, consciousness beginning to slip away from her.

They were safe. That was all that mattered. She looked down at Ben, who was still clinging to her hand and watching her anxiously. Leia followed her gaze, gazing at Ben curiously.

"This is your nephew, Ben," she said before everything went black.

\- -

_Home One_

The Alliance medical ward hadn’t changed much since she’d been away. Nearly a decade later, and was still run by overstretched doctors and fussy medical droids who gave her the same unnecessary lectures on overextending herself she's heard a dozen times before. They treated her for the electrical burns and bruises, including a stint in a bacta tank that she had argued wasn't necessary, and eventually left her alone to rest again. 

She slept, and when she woke, Ben was burrowed into her side, his red hair a vibrant shock against her white medical robe. She had refused medical treatment until they'd treated him first, making sure that the lightning burns along his side were soaked in bacta before she let a medical droid touch her. The doctors had assured her that he'd recover quickly; the bruises and burns would fade away to nothing within weeks. The psychological scars, on the other hand, would be another matter. 

He stirred and turned his head up to look at her, blinking sleep out of his eyes. “Are you okay, Mom?” he mumbled. 

“Yes,” she said, smiling and stroking his hair. She felt _safe_ for the first time since Ben had been born. It was _wonderful._

“You passed out on the deck,” he informed her solemnly. "Chewbacca picked you right up brought you to the doctors." She smiled. She’d missed the Wookie. “He's just like in your stories! I can’t understand him yet but Uncle Han says that Uncle Chewie will teach me Shyriiwook if we stay.” His face fell. “Are we staying, Mom?”

“I hope so, Ben.” 

Mara sensed a familiar presence enter the room and looked up to see Leia smiled gently, almost shyly, from the doorway. 

“Ben, go look for your Uncle Chewie,” Mara said. “I need to talk to Leia.”

Ben looked over at Leia and back at his mother. “Are you sure, Mom?”Ben said, reluctant to leave her side.

“I’m fine, Ben. Go visit with your uncles.” 

Ben did as he was told, sliding off the medical cot and giving Leia a curious look as he left the room.

"How are you feeling?” Leia said, as she crossed the room and pulled a chair over to the side of Mara's bed. 

"Better." 

There was an awkward moment. Mara couldn't quite meet Leia's steady gaze. 

“What happened to you, Mara?" Leia asked. She reached across and took Mara's hand and Mara gripped it tightly. "When I realized Luke had been killed, I searched and searched for you. I used every resource in Intelligence I could get my hands on; Cracken’s still annoyed at me!” She flashed Mara a smile that was both sardonic and sad. “Where have you been all these years?” 

 _Nowhere and everywhere,_ Mara thought; it seemed like a lifetime had passed since she had seen Leia. She began to speak, beginning with Dagobah and the clandestine training she and Luke had done while Han and Leia had been fleeing from Vader, but faltered when she came to telling her about what had happened on Bespin. 

"I felt him die," Leia said. 

"The worst moment of my life," Mara whispered. Leia squeezed her hand.

"I didn't understand how I could have felt it,” Leia mused. “You two were the Jedi and I was... well, I guess we know why now."

“Ben told you?”

“Yes, I asked him why you called him my nephew. I’d hoped to be an honorary aunt one day, but I didn’t expect…” She trailed off, her face twisting as she considered her parentage. It was clear that wasn’t going to be easy for her to come to terms with it.

Mara felt the sting of guilt. "Yoda told me. He wanted me to seek you out and train you to face Vader, but I couldn't, Leia. I had to keep Ben safe, and I didn't believe the Alliance could protect him. I'm sorry."

"I understand," Leia said. “I’m… glad I didn’t have to face him again. I have you to thank for that.” This time, Mara squeezed Leia’s hand as the other woman composed herself and offered a wry smile. "Am I going to get these visions and feelings regularly now? Because I have to say, I'm not a fan."

Mara snorted.

“I’ve _missed_ you, Mara,” Leia smiled. “I want to know _everything_ about Ben.”

There was so much to tell and Mara didn’t have the strength yet to tell it all, and so she gave Leia an abbreviated sketch of Ben’s birth and childhood. The conversation turned to what had happened at Vespaxan, and Mara told Leia about her battle with the Emperor, a story she knew she’d be recounting over and over again in the coming days. 

"I still can't believe you came," Mara admitted.

"It wasn't easy convincing Ackbar to move up the date of the assault on Vespaxan," Leia said. "Though they're happy with the outcome, obviously."

“What happened after I passed out? Did you win the battle?”

“Piett pulled the Imperial fleet out and fled to Coruscant. We didn’t understand why at the time, but it seems he wanted to salvage his ships, and with Palpatine gone, there was no one to order him to stay and fight to the last man. We won.” 

They were both silent for a while, contemplating a future that they’d only ever dreamed about. They’d both been born in the Empire and never known a galaxy that wasn’t under Palpatine’s command. 

“You’re still tired,” Leia said, reluctantly releasing Mara’s hand and standing. “Rest a bit more, and then we’ll talk again.” 

\- -

When Mara woke, Ben had disappeared again, his irrepressible curiosity luring him away from her side to explore the Alliance ship. She still kept a light mental tether in place to keep track of him but otherwise let him wander, content that he’d be safe in the Alliance’s hands and under the eye of his new-found family.

Leia had left a set of clothes for her to change into, and with a pang, Mara realized that the tunic and pants were her own, left on the _Falcon_ all those years before. They hadn’t tossed her things. Her old clothes didn’t fit quite right anymore, but they were _hers_.

The boots and quilted jacket were probably borrowed since she didn’t recognize them and they were slightly too big for her. She was just shrugging into the jacket when she felt a familiar presence at the door. 

"Hey, kid." Han Solo stood in the doorway, smiling that crooked smile that made Mara's heart seize up in her chest. He stepped forward and pulled her into a hug. She stiffened at first but then relaxed into his embrace, choking back the tears that suddenly threatened to fall.

"I couldn't couldn't protect him, Han." It all came tumbling out. "He wouldn't let me go with him to face Vader."

She’d failed Han; she’d failed _all_ of them.

"I know. Leia told me." 

She’d held herself together in front of Leia, but in the face of Han's gentle reassurance, she found herself crumbling. He gave her a couple of minutes to get herself under control again, gently rubbing her back. When she could speak without falling apart, she eased away and gave him a shaky smile, wiping away her tears with the back of her hand.

“It’s good to have you back, Mara,” Han said. “We all thought you’d died. Well, except for Leia. She knew, somehow, never gave up hope. We had no idea you were running around the galaxy with Luke’s kid!”

Mara laughed, snuffling a little.

Han smiled at her. "Your kid's a pip. I hope Leia and I do as well with ours. We’re expecting two!"

Mara grinned. “You’ll do fine, Han.” 

"Honestly, he’s a hell of kid. He's pickpocketed everyone on Leia's staff, and still made them all fall in love with him. I think he's using some sort of Force trick there." 

"Oh no," Mara said softly. 

"Luke would have been proud of him." 

He would. He should have been here. 

"Your children will be strong in the force, too." Mara knew that they both didn't want to get into the issue of their children's bloodline right now, but she wondered if Han had considered the implications of their heritage.

"Yeah, I figured. But they'll have you to train them in all your mystical ways."

"What?" Mara stared at him. "I'm not a Jedi master, Han. I never even finished my training."

"Leia told me that your Jedi master—" he said that last bit as a question, and Mara nodded. "...died. You're all we've got, kid."

The weight of the responsibility staggered her a little, but she had to set it aside for later. It was too overwhelming.

“I didn’t think Leia would forgive me for leaving.” Even after their conversation, Mara was still incredulous that Leia had accepted her so easily.

“Are you kidding? She’s been worried sick about you for—how many years has it been? Seven? You’re family, Mara.”

 _Family._ For so long she’d thought of them as something she’d lost when Luke died, and a part that couldn’t believe that they’d welcomed her back after she’d abandoned them. 

“But I walked away. I hid Ben from all of you.”

Han put his hands on her shoulders. “But you did come back. That’s not easy; I know a thing or two about running.” He offered her that crooked smile again.

His kindness was almost too much for her, and she began to babble: "Ben and I—we need a place to stay, and I need to find some way to repay the Alliance—” 

"Hey, one thing at a time! First of all, you're staying with us. Spend some time with Leia. Relax. You could both use a break, and she won't take it from me.” He wrapped an arm around her shoulder as he led her gently out of the room. “Get her to tell you the story of how she rescued me from Jabba the Hutt. That's a good one." 

\- -

Mara stood before a viewport on _Home One,_ staring at the field of stars before her, alone. She ran her fingers over the lightsaber that hung at her belt, tracing the familiar lines and ridges. It was strange to be carrying it openly. Even during her previous stint with the Alliance, she’d hadn’t worn her old lightsaber openly very often, since it would have been foolish to carry a weapon that identified her so easily. But now that she was no longer a fugitive, she could finally claim the honor of wearing the emblem of the Jedi. It had been Luke's lightsaber, and his father's before him. Now it was hers.

A subtle shift in the Force announced the manifestation of a presence that was both there beside her and wasn't there at all. She didn't turn to face him.

"Vader."

"My name is Anakin."

Out of the corner of her eye, she could see the shimmering ghost of a much younger man with dark eyes and mass of curled hair. He still _felt_ like Vader, but without the shadow of darkness and anger. It was disorienting.

"How are you even here?"

"I turned away from the Dark side in order to defend my family from Sidious. I turned back to the light side of the Force at the end."

“That’s all?”

“It isn’t easy to throw off Sidious’s control. You know that, Mara,” the ghost sighed. "I regretted everything I had become. I hope that you can forgive me one day."

In spite of what he had given her at the end, Mara wasn’t sure she could do that. _Of the Jedi, forgiveness is,_ Mara could imagine Yoda saying, and of the Jedi teachings he had instilled in her. She thought of Luke and his capacity to reach out to others, even to a woman who'd been raised by a Sith Lord.

But Vader had done unforgivable things to her. She thought of the cold and hollow part of her mind where the bond with Luke had once been, of raising Ben alone and in constant terror of being discovered, of the years of desperate survival while being hunted across the galaxy. Vader had handed her and her son over to the Emperor, who had nearly killed her, tortured Ben, and would have turned him to the dark side.

"It'll take time."

It was the best she could offer him.

“I hope that Ben and Leia can forgive me one day too.”

“I don’t think Leia knows how to process it. She doesn’t even know who her mother was.”

"Her name was Padme. She died in childbirth."

Mara felt a flash of anger, though she wasn't entirely sure if she was angry _at_ Padme or _for_ her. She gave birth to the next line of Skywalkers and then conveniently died, never witnessing the monster her husband would become, the monster who would one day murder their son and hunt their grandson to the edges of the galaxy. She hadn't even left her name behind. 

“Do you know who my parents were?” The Emperor had denied Ben the chance to know any of his grandparents.

He shook his head regretfully. “Palpatine never told me, and I never asked. I never paid that much attention to you until you ran off with my son.”

Mara’s lip twitched a little at that. Her hand fell to the lightsaber at her belt and she ran her fingers over the hilt again. Anakin’s eyes followed the motion. It had been his once too.

"I'm carrying it for him, not for you," she said sharply.

He inclined his head in acknowledgment. "You have every right to, Mara. You're the first of the new Jedi."

"I never wanted that," she said softly.

She no longer had a master to confer on her the title of a Jedi, but she realized that she didn’t need one anymore. She’d become a Jedi when she took up a lightsaber and faced Palpatine, and now she’d carry that mantle with pride.

But rebuilding the Jedi again, that was a responsibility she hadn’t expected.

"You’re the only one left who can pass on the Jedi tradition. You could rebuild the order again as a beacon of hope and justice for the galaxy.”

Mara considered this. "It would have infuriated Palpatine."

He actually beamed at her. "Imagine the look on his face." 

The moment of camaraderie, brief as it was, was a little unsettling. She'd hated him for so many years. 

Anakin sighed. “I can’t stay any longer.”

“Wait,” Mara said. "If you see Luke wherever it is you are, tell him about Ben. Tell him I still miss him. Tell him—" There was so much to say and Mara couldn’t fit it all into words. "We're going to be okay."

"He knows that, Mara. He always has." He began to fade from sight. “May the Force be with you, Mara.”

The man who had been Luke’s father, Ben’s grandfather, and the source of her nightmares for nearly a decade vanished forever.

Mara felt as though the universe had shifted around her. Vader was gone. She’d killed the Emperor. She now held the future of the Jedi Order in her hands. She was no longer being hunted, with every day to day decision focused on simple survival; she no longer had to live in fear. She thought of Ben, now _safe,_ of Han and Leia, and the burgeoning New Republic.

Her hand tightened around Luke’s lightsaber. She missed him, and wished more than anything that he could be here, standing by her side. She wished he’d been able to meet Ben. But she knew that they _would_ be okay. They had their family again, and she had a new purpose. For the first time, she could imagine a future for her and Ben.

It was full of hope.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading my weird little AU! A companion/epilogue fic will be posted next week. I'm celinamarniss on tumblr too, if you want to stop by and say hi. 
> 
> frangipani is the champion and hero behind Legacy. She coaxed me into completing and posting the fic, and offered suggestions for improving it. 
> 
> All other mistakes are mine, obviously.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to frangipani for the beta and moral support.


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